


Quick, Hold My Memories

by slimecrime



Category: Promare (2019)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, Hurt/Comfort, Lio Is Cold headcanon, Lio is like a Lizard, M/M, Mad Burnish (Promare), Post-Canon, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Trans Galo Thymos, Trans Lio Fotia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-04
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:29:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 33,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23471725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slimecrime/pseuds/slimecrime
Summary: “This isn’t who I’m supposed to be,” he says. “I’m sorry. I feel like I’m not even the person you saved anymore. I’m really sorry, Galo Thymos.”Galo frowns, his jaw tight and stressed.“You’re still you,” he tells him firmly. “You still have it in you somewhere, even if you need to take some time to find it again.”—An exploration of Lio recovering from losing his identity as a Burnish while attempting to enter a relationship during uncertain times.
Relationships: Lio Fotia & Galo Thymos
Comments: 19
Kudos: 64





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Information: the first three chapters of this is a collection of oneshots that I’ve already posted plus additional chapters I will be posting. I had them set up as just a three part series collection, but I have too many ideas and would rather they were all in one place bc I plan to continue them as a multi chapter fic. 
> 
> I don’t want to delete the existing fics, so that people who have bookmarked them can still find them and so I can still see their comments. 
> 
> I don’t use ao3 much so I don’t know how acceptable this is, I just want them all in one fic so it’s easier for me to add to it. If u have already read those fics, there will be more. If u haven’t, I hope you enjoy them!

There has been no break in the tireless rush of cleanup, organization, volunteer, distribute meals, find blankets, cleanup, build housing, distribute housing, find more blankets, treat the sick, find more doctors, find more volunteers, find more food, get more resources. They all had just been quaking through the days, unsure if they themselves had slept or eaten. They'd been handed food too, of course. They'd been given time to sleep too, of course. But after uncounted hours throughout fuzzy and poorly defined days, Lio had begun to lose the battle between his will and his body.

"You should just sleep," he tells Galo first.

The two of them had been awarded a few hours to rest this morning. It's questionable, however, if they'll be able to take that time. Even when they're given moments of silence, there's always something unexpected that needs their help. It's hard to predict. It's hard to organize. The mess seems just too big to clean up.

But they were promised a few hours.

"I want to shower," Galo says, not moving a muscle. His eyes drift closed and his chest rises with a sigh under Lio's head.

Lio intends to respond with a quick "You do need a shower..." but all that comes out of his mouth is a hum. He buries his face into Galo's t-shirt. His fingers press against the soft jersey fabric in idle circles, the warmth of his body seeping through. Galo's hand is heavy and limp on his back. He wants nothing more than to be swallowed by the heat and safety of his arms, to fall asleep like this for days and days.

But his stomach is filled with a profound hunger that swells up into his throat. His brain floats side to side and he can feel his own heartbeat in every muscle in his body. He can feel it in the tips of his fingers and toes and he can feel it thudding down deep in his abdomen. He wants nothing more than to sleep and eat and drink water and shower and sleep and sleep and sleep. His mouth is dry and unconsciousness just will not take him, no matter what he does.

And something else is there too. There's something else making his stomach sick besides hunger and exhaustion. There's something very wrong. There's so much that is very very wrong.

His own body is cold. Freezing cold. The loss of the heat of his flames was like the sudden deprivation of an entire sense, like he'd lost the ability to touch, like he'd lost the ability to think, like he'd lost part of his mind. He can feel his skin practically shaking from the desperate beats of his heart, and the heat of Galo's body is barely a fraction of the warmth he needs. He is absolutely ice cold.

And.

And...

There is one more thing. There is one other thing digging its way into the depths of his body. One more pressing thing, as he clings to the strongest source of heat he has. The only thing that keeps him warm, that he has been unable to keep his fingers off of in all their downtime. In every restful moment, Lio has, without thought, because he honestly just has no thoughts to spare, sunk his fingers deeply into the warmth of this body. Galo is so willing, too, to hold him. He is so willing to wrap him in his arms. He is so willing to crush him into his ribs and muscles.

But.

But.

Lio swallows and his tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth. Hunger and nausea and the frigid emptiness of his body build up as bile in the back of his throat. He bites hard on his lip and peels back the dry top layer of skin, tasting the iron, stinging, blood beneath. He strokes the jersey cotton t-shirt that stretches so well over this beautiful man's chest. He cranes his neck and stares up at the underside of his chin. His eyes are peacefully closed, and his jaw is slack, and his breathing is calm. Lio stares at him through his own uncombed blonde hair and cannot will himself to take a breath.

Who is Galo Thymos?

Who is Galo Thymos?

Who on earth is this man he is clinging to? Who saved his life? Who breathed his own fire back into his chest? Who has been holding him tightly at every spare moment? Who has been laughing with him through the grueling exhaustion? Who seems to be convinced, just as much as he has, by an unbeatable potion of adrenaline and the unreality of trauma, that he ought to give him every ounce of love he can?

His throat closes up and he cannot cry.

"Galo?"

He doesn't answer him. He's alseep. He should let him sleep. Lio should sleep too. He's too tired to figure this out. He's too tired and scared and cold to figure this out.

"Galo?"

Fear pricks and burns inside his chest.

Galo's arm is heavy and huge on his back as he is crushed between his body and the couch. Lio tries to push himself up without disturbing him too much. He, fortunately, seems to be having no trouble staying asleep, so Lio is able to carefully reach his arm over his ribs. He stretches himself over his torso. He pulls his leg over next, stretching until his toe touches the floor, until he is in the middle of his chest and staring into his face.

Galo continues to sleep so deeply. His expression is entirely innocent, entirely void of any emotion that could ever hurt him. He is completely still aside from soft breaths. But who is he? Who is he? He's a firefighter. Who knows what he believes? Who knows what he thinks? Who knows what he thinks of him, of his friends, of the people he loves, of the people he himself has soothed from flaming sobs?

He drags the rest of himself over his body, and momentarily crumples onto the floor beside the couch. He takes a few nervous steps back, and stares at him. He clutches his own skinny wrists in his cold and shaking fingers.

"Galo?"

The air is cold around him. His body is small and empty. He is incredibly, incredibly empty. The void immediately around him crawls up his back and he can't seem to make his own arms grip himself tight enough. He glances over his shoulder, at every corner, at the doorway, at the kitchen cabinets, at the bright morning light coming from the windows.

Lio realizes he has never felt a fear so void of anger in all his life.

He remembers the searing, pulling, stabbing, ripping pain of the engine, pulling like needles and threads from every single nerve in his body to stretch his form into something far greater than ever should've been possible. He remembers falling apart, disappearing into the numb thumping of his heart. The memory envelopes him, now that he is so so cold. Now that his body is so exposed to the sheer emptiness of air.

He remembers, he remembers, the only thing that made that pain stop, the only thing, the first thing he felt that wasn't pain, that didn't hurt or burn or pull or stab or kill. He remembers, with anguish, his flames flowing down into him, and warming his core so gently. And he remembers, with twisting knots in his stomach, the delicate touch of Galo's fingers on his jaw, and the taste of his breath, and the soft and sad and desperate shape of his mouth.

And he wants the ghost of pain to stop. He wants it to stop, and he wants to feel warm, he wants to feel safe, he wants to feel strong, and fine, and safe, and fine. He wants to feel fine. He wants to eat and drink and sleep and feel fine. He wants to feel strong again. God, he was so strong. He's done so much, hasn't he? What right to fear does he have? What right to fear does he have for this man who saved him?

There are so many people counting on him to help them rebuild their shattered lives. What right does he have to fear right now? Especially fear of something like this?

He takes a deep breath. He pulls his fingers away from his wrists and brings his arms down to his sides. He swallows. He rolls up the sleeves of his sweatshirt. He takes a long look at Galo’s gently sleeping form, and feels nothing but an unquenchable urge to kiss him into oblivion.

He leans over him gently, carefully, cautiously. His very messy hair drapes onto his neck. He presses his lips so softly onto his and holds tight with his mouth. For this moment, he swells with nothing at all but pure love. This kiss alone is enough to warm his soul and fill his starving body. He almost reconsiders just falling back into his arms and laying back down on his chest.

But then Lio pulls away. And as soon as he does, Galo’s eyelids flutter and he does his best to look at him through a veil of sleep.

Lio strokes his cheek for a moment.

“Go back to sleep. I’m going to go check on Gueira and Meis.”

Galo hums and smiles despite his exhausted eyes, and, in a state that probably does not qualify as awake, wraps his arms around Lio and pulls him tight to his chest. Lio’s face falls into the safe crook of his neck.

“No,” Galo mumbles playfully into his hair. “You need to sleep. Stay.”

Lio laughs as fear and love begin to flood his system.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I can’t sleep. I’m too…”

Galo releases him from the embrace. He is still smiling, but his eyes are begging him to go back to sleep.

“Everything’s going to be okay,” he mumbles. “I know there’s a lot to be scared of, but everyone’s alright. You have to take care of yourself.”

Something inside Lio melts. His eyes begin to well up and his head starts to hurt. He takes one sharp breath in and the next one out is a wracking sob. He suddenly can’t take a single normal breath and his whole body shakes. His entire face is soaked with tears.

Galo, panicked, dredges himself from his sleepy stupor and sits up as best he can. He wraps his arms around Lio and rubs circles over his back.

“I’m sorry,” he says, still only half awake. “I didn’t mean to- You can go check on them if that’s what you want.”

Lio can’t seem to get a hold of himself long enough to explain. He’s not even sure he has an explanation.

“Did something happen? Did someone hurt them?” he asks, clearly ready to fight, to fix this, to defend them. Clearly ready to do whatever he needs to. Clearly ready and loving and open and warm and perfect.

“No,” Lio manages. “No, they’re fine.”

Galo relaxes, and puts a hand on Lio’s face. His eyes are filled with worry and Lio feels sick in his heart as that worry turns to Galo's own tears.

Lio puts all of his energy into calming down if only to stop himself from making Galo cry too. He could never stand to be responsible for that. He tries to relearn how to take a normal breath and looks away from his face. He stares hard at the fabric of the couch and tells himself over and over again:

You have to calm down. You have to calm down.

But the more he tries the worse it becomes. He is completely swallowed by whatever this is. Fear? Panic? Sorrow? Pain? It doesn’t matter. He can’t stop feeling and feeling and feeling.

Galo pulls him into his chest and kisses him on the cheek and on the temple and jaw and hair.

Lio gives in and lies back down next to him, falling back into the comfort of his arms. He enjoys the warmth and the safety and the feeling, the strange and uncomfortable, horrifying feeling, that this person may, at least in this moment, really love him.

“We have to go on a date,” Lio manages. “We need to go out and get pizza or smoke together or something. You can’t just…”

He starts laughing, partly at how scared he is of his own love for Galo, and partly at how incredibly endearingly bone crushing this hug is.

“You can’t just keep killing me with your love like this until we’ve had some time to talk.”

He smiles and breathes, but the tears don't stop. He pushes his face deeper into his neck and kisses him softly.

“Okay. Are you free any time soon?” Galo mumbles.

“I have to check my schedule,” Lio says.

Galo laughs.

“Are you alright?” he whispers, looking down into his eyes. His brow creases and his eyes are exhausted. 

“I’m okay,” Lio assures him. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what that was. Or what this is.”

“It’s okay,” he says. “Don’t apologize.”

His eyes are closed and it’s clear that he’s still fighting to stay awake. Lio becomes still again and begins to softly touch the fabric of Galo's shirt. It's worth seeing where this goes, he decides. He is still hungry and empty, but exhaustion was beginning to finally win over the anxiety. Galo strokes his arm softly, and it's somehow the most comforting thing Lio has ever felt. 

Lio's eyes begin to drift closed as they become heavier and heavier. His muscles relax and Galo’s arms become looser, though he still keeps a hand on his waist. He slowly begins to drift into the warmth of sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

"Where the hell is this place? It's like it just disappeared," says Galo.

It has been two months now, and while the cleanup has in no way ceased, the situation is becoming less dire. Buildings seem to fly up overnight with the technology the rescue team has access to. The city looks nice and clean and sparkling fresh, and a chilly spring breeze blows calmly through the shining streets. Leaves skitter over the freshly paved sidewalk. Brand new leaves from brand new trees! Shot fresh out of a big huge gun on a sick new robot! 

Galo stretches his arms up toward the sun. 

The city looks even newer and fancier than it did before. Glittering white skyscrapers stretch into the bright and cold morning sky, so far unscathed by wear and weather. Even the sidewalk is bright and blinding with how untouched it is, with only a few weeks worth of footsteps to its name. It's as though a glowing utopia just sprung up from the ground along with the snow drops.

"That's because it did," says Lio. 

"Aw, what!" Galo exclaimed. 

"The pizza place moved. It's not here anymore," Lio says very bluntly. "Or at least it hasn't been put back up yet."

The two reached the spot in the city where there was once Galo's (second) favorite pizza place. Now, there was simply an empty space between two buildings, like they'd just picked it up and left. 

Galo sinks to the concrete.

"Now what are we supposed to do?" he whines.

"Well, we aren't getting pizza. At least not this pizza," Lio tells him. 

"I wanted to finally take you out for lunch, though," Galo sighs. "I wanted you to taste this awesome pizza. It's my second favorite pizza. Lio..." 

Lio pats him gently on the head. 

"Well, we can come back another time. Maybe call the owner and ask when they'll be back if it really seems urgent," he suggests. "For now we can go somewhere else. I don't know. What's your third favorite pizza place?"

He pulls out his phone and prepares to put in a new address. 

"Nah, that's all the way across town," Galo tells him. "Let's just, I don't know. Die."

"Yeah, okay," Lio shrugs. He puts his phone in his pocket and then hauls Galo to his feet. He dusts him off as he stands dejected and unconvinced on the quiet street. 

"There's a burger place right down there. Have you been there before? Is it good?" he suggests. 

"I don't know. It's fine I guess. You wanna just get that to go and then go to the park or something?" Galo says. 

Lio shrugs. "That's fine."

The park is bright and green against a sterile city and a clear blue sky. There aren't many people out right now. Many are still disoriented from the disaster, their lives upheaved and thrown against a wall. The cleanup effort has been nonstop as well, so this is the first time Lio and Galo have had any real time to rest. This is probably the closest to a "normal" day they've had since the earth had burned. It doesn't truly feel normal, though.

Galo takes a bite of the burger and something about it just doesn't feel right. Something about it almost makes him a little sick.

"Is this gross to you? Is yours gross?" he asks.

Lio hasn't even opened his yet. It sits in his lap in a white paper box. 

"I'm not very hungry," he says. "I might, save it. I don't know."

"Tell me if this is gross," Galo says. He offers him his own burger with minor urgency. "Just take a bite of it. Is it gross?"

Lio leans over and takes a bite out of the burger in Galo's hands. He chews it with a completely unnecessary level of thoughtfulness 

"I meant like, take it from me," he laughs. 

"Sorry," he says with his mouth full. "It's not that gross. I don't know."

"Hmm..." Galo says.

"I'm not that hungry, though," he says.

"Yeah. Maybe I'm not hungry either."

Lio nods.

"Are you alright?" he asks.

"Yeah. Are you?"

"Yeah." 

The park is so quiet. There aren’t even insects humming. A bird chirps in a bush somewhere, but otherwise the air is cool and silent. They are completely alone in the sun together. There isn’t even a cloud in the sky for company.

“I know we both have the day off,” Galo says. “But do you want to just, go back? To burning rescue?”

Lio leans on his hand. His legs are crossed and his foot taps the air. His ankle boots are brand new. This is the first time he’s been able to wear them. He was very excited about that this morning. They are black and covered in studs with pointed toes.

“Hmm,” he thinks. “Do you want to go back to my apartment instead?” 

Galo’s heart flutters a little. 

“Sure,” he says. “Is that okay? Wait, I uh...”

“I sort of, uh, want to talk to you privately, anyway…” Lio says, smirking with his eyes closed and his fingers combing his hair. “I told you, I wanted to talk to you.” 

“Oh, uh, yeah,” Galo says. “Sure.”

He’s suddenly nervous in a less good way. But he is smiling. It’s probably nothing terrible. 

“This is still a date, right?” Galo asks.

“Of course it is,” Lio says, smiling a little more. He still doesn’t look up at him. His fingers wind tighter into his hair. His foot keeps tapping the empty air.

\----

Galo flops down on Lio’s very familiar couch. It’s not the greatest couch, if we’re being honest. It’s brand new, and cheap and a boring navy blue. The rest of his apartment is sparsely decorated, with white walls and white tile floors and grey carpet and plain cabinets. The bare, corporate, minimum. 

The only thing making the apartment feel like anyone lives in it is the dishes in the sink and the clothes on the chairs. There is of course, some lovely lovely artwork by Galo himself hanging in the living room: A gorgeous piece of ripped notebook paper with an illustration of a little doggie taped to the wall. (Drawn in sharpie.) (Galo Thymos, 2020)

“So,” says Lio, sitting down on the couch. “Like, this might be, a shitty conversation. Maybe. I mean, it shouldn’t be. I don’t know. It might not even be relevant? You probably already know, I don’t know, but like. Just. Give me the benefit of the doubt, okay?”

Galo nods, not sure where this is going. “Okay.”

“Like, you’ve seen me shirtless and didn’t, like, say anything, but we haven’t slept together yet, and, I don’t know how aware you are, of anything, plus you’re kind of an idiot sometimes. I mean that in the best possible way…” Lio rambles.

There is a pause. Galo waits for him to continue, but, oh, his chest. Oh, the scars on his chest. Oh- 

“Like, you didn’t ask about it, so I don’t know if that means you’re cool with it, or if you just don’t know what it is, but- “ Lio swallows. “I just want to make sure you are aware, that, I like, am like, trans. And also, make sure that you know what that means.” 

There is silence while Galo thinks of what to do. This isn’t a situation he’s ever been in before. He leans on his arm and smiles into his palm.

Galo can’t stop himself from laughing suddenly. Then he remembers that that is the worst possible thing to do in this situation. That was probably, actually, the second scariest possible thing he could have done. Oh great, good job. 

Lio recoils away from him, and glares. 

“Sorry, no no. Sorry. Okay- I need to just, explain. I’m not laughing at you,” Galo says hastily. “I’m an idiot. You said it yourself. I’m the world’s #1 idiot, remember?” 

Lio grips the couch with white knuckles and glares at him with an incredible anger and hurt that he hopes he never sees again, a pain that he has to heal immediately. 

“Listen, I forget all the time, But- ” Galo says. How does he save this? How does he explain? “It’s funny because I’m usually on the other end of this conversation. I mean, it’s not funny. I would be really upset if someone laughed at me, like I just did- uhm-”

Lio just stares at him. 

“I just got excited- I’m not laughing at you- I didn’t laugh at you- I know this is hard-” he stammers. 

“What are you talking about?” Lio hisses. 

Galo swallows and straightens his posture. He takes a deep breath.

“I transitioned when I was a teenager, though I never had top surgery, and I’ve pretty much been stealth since I was 19. And at this point in my life, I mostly just forget about it, honestly,” Galo finally explains. “I also haven’t really dated anyone in a while, so it really doesn’t come up much at all…” 

Lio relaxes, his eyes go distant for a moment while he thinks.

“Are you just saying that to save your ass?” Lio asks.

“No! No, I… I still have my tits and no one has any idea. It’s hilarious,” he says. “They’re out 24 hours a day and no one knows.” 

Lio, thankfully, also laughs. First a little bit, and then a little more. It’s an awkward, excited, relieved laugh. 

“I, actually, wasn’t even sure how to tell you,” Galo admits, starting to laugh in the same way. “Because, uh, yeah I did know what your scars are, but I also knew you probably assumed I was cis, so it’s not like when I’ve had to tell a cis person I’m dating. I don’t know.”

“I’m sorry,” Lio says, still laughing. “I should know better than to assume.” 

“It’s okay. I should’ve known better than to laugh,” says Galo.

“We’re both bad. We both suck. This sucks.”

Galo picks him up in his arms and kisses him on the cheek. He pulls him back to lie down on the armrest of the couch. Lio’s head rests perfectly against his neck. Excited, nervous, and fluttery laughter continues to grip them both.

“Okay, well,” Lio starts. “That’s not how I was expecting this conversation to go, so now my plans have to change.”

“Oh yeah, what were your plans?”

“Well,” he says. “The rest of this conversation was and is still the same, where I ask if you want to actually finally fuck, or whatever. But, I was less worried that you’d be upset about it and more worried you’d just tell me it’s not your thing, or that you’re not “into toys” or whatever, like the last cis guy I tried to date. And then I was going to be like, “no, really it’s not that bad-” and it wasn’t going to work and I was going to go home and cry, because you’re-”

He stops and swallows and scrunches his fingers on Galo’s shirt. There is patient silence while he tries to get his words right.

“I really enjoy…” he starts. His voice is shaking. “I really like being with you and it would really suck if-”

He buries his face into the crook of his neck. 

“It’s okay. I know, I-”

Galo enjoys the weight of Lio’s body against his. He loves the feeling of him underneath his arm, across his chest. He loves the way he always plays with the collar of his t-shirt. He loves the way he always wraps one leg around his. 

“I was also still a little worried that when I told you, you might be disappointed,” Galo admits. “I had no idea what you were expecting from me, so…” 

Lio fully wraps his arms around his ribs until his fingers touch.

“Why would I be disappointed?” 

“I don’t know. You never know.”

“Yeah, that’s true.” 

More silence follows as the afternoon light grows more golden. The subdued sounds of a brand new city flow in on the breeze. A few cars, a few conversations, but mostly just quiet. Lio’s curtains, which are sheer and white and sterile, flow gently in the sun.

Lio laughs again.

“So now, I have to have an entirely different conversation with you about how I want to have sex with you,” he says. “You know, if you wanted to, I mean.”

“Yeah I-” Galo hesitates. “I’ve actually, never, slept with another trans guy before…” 

“Really?”

“Yeah. I- listen. Don’t look at me. I haven’t actually slept with that many people before. I don’t really do a lot of casual stuff. I don’t know. I’ve been in two long-term relationships, and I haven’t dated anyone in maybe a year.” 

“Really?” 

“I told you to stop looking at me.”

“Sorry, you’re just incredibly hot and incredibly nice. I’m completely offended on your behalf. Honestly, humbled that you’re single and that I get to be here with you.” 

“Well, it’s my own choice. I’m sure you’ve done lot’s of stuff. I know you’re a fucking big gang boss and whatever. I’m sure you know what you’re doing.” 

Lio laughs into his shirt.

“I- yeah, well…” he sighs, smiling, maybe blushing. “I actually only started T like, a year and a half ago, and before that I uh… I definitely did sleep with people but it wasn’t great. I don’t think I had sex that I really enjoyed until pretty recently.” 

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Galo says.

“I realized I was burnish way before anything else, and I was homeless the first time when I was 16,” he says. “It took me a really long time to deal with the fact that I was trans. I was so caught up in everything else, everything was already so unstable. 

The people around me were already so terrible, and my survival hinged on pretty loose acceptance… I was scared of making it worse, and then I was on waiting lists forever.” 

Galo doesn’t know what to say, so he says “I’m sorry,” again.

“Don’t be,” Lio insists. “Don’t you dare feel bad for me. I promise it’s completely fine. I’m happier now than I ever have been. I have friends who I know for a fact love me, and I love them. Anyone who’s hurt me doesn’t deserve a second of my thoughts.” 

Galo still kisses him on the temple, regardless. 

“We burned the earth to the ground together,” he says. “What do they even have one me? Fuck, even the other ex-burnish- I even saved the ones who-” 

“It’s okay,” Galo says. “I know how strong you are. You’re probably the strongest person I can think of, if we’re being honest. It’s okay. But I still don’t think you deserved any of that. I’m glad you’re in a better place now.” 

Lio doesn’t have anything to say to that and just chews his lip. His paler fingers stroke up Galo’s cheek, drawing themselves along his chin. He presses his lips delicately into his jaw. Then he lays his head back on Galo’s collar. 

Galo wonders if he can feel how warm his heart is.

“This is also, if we’re being real here,” Lio says. “This is the longest I’ve ever waited to sleep with someone I was dating, and I’m kind of proud of myself. I’m also actually enjoying getting to know you, though, and you haven’t tried anything shitty with me.” 

He kisses just under Galo’s jaw and it warms his entire body. 

“We have been pretty busy,” Galo says. “It could’ve happened sooner.”

Lio kisses his jaw again, this time a little harder, and he can feel him smiling.

“I’m sort of glad I was forced to wait. I’m glad I got to meet you first,” he says softly. 

Galo laughs as his warm breath tickles his face, and as he opens his mouth to press his teeth against his cheek. 

“So,” Lio says. “I have a decent collection of toys, unless you have your own that you like better. I don’t know how you feel about yourself, but I haven’t had a lot of issues with any of my own shit since I started T. I do like to wear the strap, but if you really hate to bottom I get it. I mean, if you’re interested.” 

Galo laughs harder, his face warm and his mouth going dry. He’s so blunt about this. Oh god. He’s so prepared. 

“I don’t know. I…” he starts. “We can try some stuff. I’m not even sure what I like to do.” 

“That’s okay,” he says. “We have plenty of time to figure it out.” 

Lio sits up and leans over him, his hair curtaining both of their faces, and kisses him firmly on the mouth. It floods all the way down Galo’s nervous system, and he kisses him back with no hesitation. 

Lio sighs out of his nose and presses his lips into the corner of his mouth. Galo’s stomach flutters and he wraps his arms tightly around him. Lio breathes a little laugh into his teeth. His fingers trail across the shaved part of his head and then into the longer part of his hair. Galo pulls him even closer and finally finds the smooth inside of his mouth.


	3. Chapter 3

“I’m sorry if this is embarrassing, but I’m completely obsessed with kissing you.”

Lio’s fingers reach down the back of Galo’s shirt, stroking the muscles on his shoulders. Galo’s face is burning hot, and the heat beats down into his core, thumping all the way into his hips. He can’t think of anything cool to say in response. He just laughs into Lio’s mouth.

Lio pulls away with visible reluctance, the very tip of his tongue lingering just slightly on his lips. He leaves Galo sitting on the edge of the bed while he goes to dig through his sock drawer.

“It’s okay. You can be obsessed with me,” Galo says, leaning back on the bed spread. He immediately feels like an idiot. He can’t believe he’s, what, nervous? Is he nervous?

Lio just hums a little laugh, pulling a little metal box out of his dresser.

“Actually, why don’t we just... do something simple to start with,” he says, not looking at him but somehow still clearly blushing. He tucks his hair behind his ear and pushes his bangs away from his face.

“Just in case we need this.”

He retrieves a small tube of lube from the box before closing it and setting it down on the pile of clothes next to his bed. He puts the tube off to the side on the sheets and then puts himself back where he was before; sitting on Galo’s hips with his hands in his soft blue hair.

Warmth and care and energy flow between the two of them with every touch, their skin and skin like conductive wires. Every little stroke and touch sparks at Galo’s insides, lighting him up again and again. 

Galo slides his larger hands down Lio’s back, around his waist, down his hips, around the pocket of his jeans, all while sighing deeply into his soft and smooth lips. He can’t seem to touch all of him enough, can’t seem to get him close enough. The muscles in his stomach twitch and spark underneath Lio’s fingers as he pushes his hands up his shirt.

Galo slowly starts to lean back, and then pulls his partner with him onto the soft mattress. He lays him on his chest.

Lio pulls his mouth away for just long enough to pull off his t-shirt, revealing pale ribs and scars. His breathing is heavy as he sits with his legs around his hips. He leans forward over him, all his weight on his hands, as the light from the evening sun glows behind his yellow hair.

“I can’t believe you’re allowed to be this hot,” Lio tells him.

“Like you have any right to say that when you’re just out here looking like this,” he says, reaching up to tuck his hair behind his ear for him. His earring dangles and glints in the light. 

Lio smiles and laughs and gives his partner’s face a few reckless, biting, kisses.

He lays down on his chest and he’s inside of his mouth again and Galo can’t keep his hands out of his hair. His hand slides down to hold the back of his neck. His skin is just so addictive to touch. 

“I’ve decided I want to make you feel really good,” Galo tells him, barely moving his mouth away from the flesh of his jaw. 

“Oh, uh huh?” he barely breathes. He laughs a little more.

“Yeah. I’ve decided that’s what we’re doing,” he says. “If you’re cool with that.”

“Yeah, I’m. Yeah, I’m cool with that,” he laughs. He drops down on one of his arms and lays down next to him.

Galo’s heart skips and his whole body feels warm and tight. His hand makes no hesitation in rubbing over Lio’s smooth and bare stomach. His fingers travel up his ribs and down his naval, eventually pressing gently over his jeans.

Lio makes the smallest gasp into his partner’s lips.

Galo clenches his own legs together hard, and pushes his fingers against Lio’s crotch, against his tight black jeans.

“Is this good?”

“Mmhmm.”

He wraps one of his legs over Lio’s, pushing his tight own crotch against him. Then he quickly undoes Lio’s pants, which he responds to with a quick breath in. His thin fingers clutch the back of Galo’s neck and all of his nerves glitter. His hot breath is wet in his ear as his teeth are soft on the back of his jaw.

He hesitates just a little bit, and then pushes his hand down into his jeans, over his underwear. He presses his fingers into the fabric over his soft flesh, and strokes upward a few times.

Lio sighs into his ear, his fingers still stroking his hair. Galo’s heart somehow races faster and his legs tighten around Lio’s. He cautiously lays his head down on his chest. Lio’s arms encircle his neck, and the tips of his fingers stroke his back.

Galo gives a few quick kisses to his collarbone, and then slips his fingers into the fly of his boxer briefs. Excitement rushes through him. Lio’s legs twitch open wider and he can hear his heart flutter in his chest. His flesh is hot and wet and soft as he drags his finger through.

Lio breathes high in his throat, his fingers winding tighter into Galo’ hair. Galo breathes hard out of his nose.

He pushes his fingers against him in a slow and forceful rhythm. Lio’s legs relax further onto the bed, spreading until they lay flat. He pushes his face into his hair, sighing gently with a loving twitch of his ribs.

Galo’s hand slides up and down smoothly, softly, perfectly, wetly. Whenhe’s sure he’s ready, he pushes a first finger in. Lio inhales deeply from his chest. Galo presses his mouth hard against his collarbone, into his neck, as his finger curls up inside him.

He rubs and presses in slow slides. He also can’t help but suck hard on his neck. Lio grasps at his back and he huffs a loud, quick breath into his ear. Galo exhales into his skin as he pulls his mouth away.

He pushes and pushes with his finger and Lio holds him tighter. His finger slides in and out with increasing fervor. Lio’s heavy breathing is interrupted only by flashes of gentle little sounds. He clutches him tighter and tighter as he strokes him deeper and deeper. His throat is filled with silent thanks, mostly keeping to quiet puffs. He does manage to push one true moan into his ear, though, before his body completely relaxes underneath him.

Galo pulls his fingers out of him, and rubs him gently with his palm just once or twice. He idly plays with his flesh. Lio kisses his ear again, but it’s tired and breathy. His hands in his hair are softer, effortless, somehow even more delicate.

Galo finally takes his hand away so that he can sit up and lean over him. As soon as he looks down at him, Lio drags his hands over his face. He cups his chin gently and rubs his thumb over his lip. His eyelids droop, and his face is soft.

Galo can think to do nothing else besides lean down and press his lips and tongue and teeth into his mouth. They kiss deeply and harshly. Lio bites softly and pulls on his lip. Then, he puts his hand up his shirt again, pushes it up to his collarbone. His thumb rubs over his nipple.

He pushes himself up, wraps an arm around his neck to hold himself steady, and kisses his chest a few times before putting his mouth over his nipple. He licks his tongue over it and sucks.

Galo leans back on his arms.

“Oh my god,” he sighs.

“Sorry, I needed to suck your nipple.”

“Yeah, you needed to-” He bursts out laughing and falls backward on the bed. Lio falls with him and laughs into his shoulder.

“My nipples don’t work anymore. I wanted to live vicariously through you,” he wheezes.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry for your loss,” Galo laughs into his hair. “That sucks.”

Lio lays over his stomach, smiling down at him and dragging his blue hair out of his face. His eyes are glittery salmon pink in the diluted orange sun. His eyelashes are long and nearly white. His smile is beaming tiredly.

Galo can’t stop himself from laughing more.

“What?” he says, fighting a smile by biting his lip. “What’s funny?”

“Nothing,” he says, making him laugh even worse. “Nothing.”

“What are you laughing at?”

Galo can’t stop and neither can Lio.

“Are you laughing because I can’t feel my nipples?” he chokes out.

Oh my god, he can’t stop. “No- No-”

“You’re so stupid,” he says like he isn’t laughing just as hard. He drops his head down over his shoulder.

Galo plants a deep kiss right under his cheek bone while they both shake with how funny absolutely nothing is.

“You’re just really cute,” Galo manages.

“Oh my god…”

Lio takes a few deep breaths.

“Do you want to smoke after this?” he breathes.

“After what?” Galo says.

“Well, I was gonna at least finger you first. I feel like it’d be rude not to,” he says.

“Oh,” he just keeps laughing.

“Is that okay? Do you wanna stop?” he asks.

“No, no,” he says. “That sounds good.”

“Okay.”

Lio plants another kiss on his lips, on his cheek, on his jaw, and down his neck. He kisses his collarbone and chest. He kisses and mouths down his ribs.

“Can I eat you out instead?”

Galo’s heart flips inside his chest. He takes a breath as Lio’s mouth moves down his naval. He puts his hands in Lio’s absolute mess of a blonde mane.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, good,” he laughs. “I’ll suck your dick and then go pack a bowl. It’ll be great.”

He kisses all the way down his abdomen, and gently bites the skin below his belly button, just before he sucks it into a bruise. Galo groans without meaning to.

“I got a new bowl, actually. It’s really cute. It looks like a little cat,” he says. “Or, wait, no I won’t subject you to a new bowl. We’ll use one of my good ones.”

“Okay, cool,” Galo manages, his breaths hitching as his hair tickles his hips.

“God, how’d you get abs like this? How’d you get so fucking shredded, man?” Lio says as he undoes the button on his jeans.

“I have,” he gasps a little as Lio kisses just above the elastic on his underwear. “I have a really specific diet and workout routine I can tell you about sometime.”

Lio laughs a little. “Okay, cool.”

And then he slips his underwear down. Galo lifts his ass up enough to help him get them down past his thighs, his heart already burning hot. Then Lio kisses his inner thighs, hard and with his teeth.

“Do you have any last requests?”

“What?”

And then his hot, wet, tongue drags over his clit, and Galo sighs with his whole chest. He gently strokes Lio’s hair, drags a little piece of it away from his mouth.

His lips and tongue are warm and wet and perfect and Galo’s stomach rises and falls with shaking breaths. Lio’s every exhale is warm against him and his legs are shaking. He feels like he might fall over even though he’s already laying down.

He huffs a little groan and plays with Lios hair, stroking the top of his head. He sighs hard out of his nose, breathing faster and faster. He feels Lio press his tongue against and on and in his flesh, filling him with nothing but vibrations and gasps and tired moans.

He can feel himself throbbing so hard that it hurts and he whines into his own bicep. His legs feel light as feathers. He can’t stop his fingers in Lio’s soft, beautiful hair. Eventually, it becomes too much, and he gasps one hard and final time. And he lingers on that gasp. And then he comes back down, feeling soaking wet and hot as the summer pavement.

Lio leans his head against his thigh and looks at him softly. He wipes off his mouth. He smirks at him and laughs just a little bit. Galo’s body begins to feel like it might be dissolving.

Lio strokes Galo’s stomach gently with the very tips of his fingers while he rests against his leg.

“I’ll go clean up and then we can go smoke,” he says, tiredly.

“Awesome,” Galo sighs, his eyes drifting closed.

“We still have those burgers to eat,” Lio reminds him. “So maybe we can finally have that.”

“Mmm…” Galo hums.

Despite what he says, he sits in silence for a few more moments. He wraps his arms around Galo’s leg, and stares at him with eyes so sweet and crystal rose.

“I think I love you,” he says, almost too quietly.

Galo breathes and breathes and breathes.

“I think I love you too,” he barely whispers.

Lio presses his face into his thigh, and kisses him just once, before he gets up to walk to the bathroom.


	4. Chapter 4

Galo lounges on the couch, one foot up on the cluttered coffee table. A brand new but small tv sits precariously on the corner, obscured only a little by the adornment of empty bottles and cans. 

It’s getting dark outside now, with the sky turning pink and grey behind the fresh new skyscrapers of Promepolis. Lio turns on the small desk lamp on the floor in the corner with a small ‘tic’. He’s holding what Galo guesses is an old black fanny pack in his hands. 

“Oh you finally got a lamp!” Galo muses. 

“Yeah we’re advancing quickly over here,” he mumbles. “Who knows, maybe one day we’ll have a separate stand for the tv.” 

“Where’d you get it?” 

“Would you believe I bought it at a store?” 

“No, it looks like trash.”

“Alright. Fine. The people up a few blocks were having their house redone or something and Gueria got it out of the big dumpster they were renting.” 

They both laugh. Lio sits down on the couch and pushes some of the trash on the table aside. He unzips the black bag and begins to carefully place the contents on the clearing. 

“This is the new bowl I haven’t used yet,” he says, unwinding a wadded sock to reveal a glass pipe that is indeed, shaped like a little cat, just as promised. It’s also bright pink.

“It’s very cute,” Galo says. 

Lio smiles a little before wrapping it back up and returning it to the bag. 

“This is the one that I hate,” he says, unwrapping another sock. “It’s just sucks and I always catch my hair on fire. And I mean that used to be fine, but I can’t live like that anymore.” 

He quickly shows him a well used and stained pipe shaped like a peach. 

“I mean, it’s still cool,” Galo says. “I just have like, a regular one that I’ve had since college. It’s just blue.” 

Lio wraps the glass peach back up in a sock and returns it to its home in the fanny pack. 

“Oh what’d you go to college for?” He asks. 

“I don’t know. I went to community college for like a year, I took some classes in back end coding for websites, but I couldn’t focus and dropped out,” he explains. “But you don’t need a degree to be a firefighter so…” 

“Oh,” Lio says sarcastically. “Galo Thymos is a college drop out.” 

“Yeah, but I can still work as an EMT,” he reminds him. 

“Oh, are you leaving burning rescue?” He asks, unrolling a third sock. 

“I mean, eventually it’s not going to be very in demand,” he says. “I'm gonna need different work. Like I’ll still probably do volunteer firefighter stuff but I probably won’t have enough hours.” 

Lio hums and unwraps a third piece, which is anticlimactically just a regular teal glass pipe. 

“I have to uh, get my GED,” he says. “I never finished high school.” 

Lio has told him this before, he thinks. 

“Oh, well…” Galo shrugs. “Do you have work yet? How are you guys paying for the apartment?” 

“Gueira found a job, I guess. There’s also the temporary relief shit the Burnish are being awarded, but I don’t have a bank account to put it in yet either.” he explains. “I’m looking for work. I at least have an address to put on applications..” 

He idly bounces the pipe in his finger tips. 

“Oh, I thought you were being paid by Burning Rescue?” He asks. 

“Oh there’s that too, but I can’t like, actually be employed by them until I do that,” he says. “I’m also not sure I want to. I mean, I need money, but…” 

He sighs and leans back into the couch. He digs a little black bag out of the fanny pack.

“Is it bad to miss being homeless? Like, I have to fucking pay rent now,” he sighs. “Like okay. No never mind, I don’t miss like, not being able to find a bathroom sometimes, and I don’t miss having to wash myself with baby wipes, but I have to fucking pay rent now.” 

He stares off at the opposite wall, which is blank and plain and barely lit by the lamp. 

“I don’t know,” he huffs out his nose. “I don’t know where my life is gonna go now. I didn’t ever plan on being part of society. I don’t know how to do that. I still haven’t mentally processed that they’re pardoning me of mass arson.” 

Galo leans on his hand on the arm of the couch. He has his own hopes for Lio’s future, where they can go on dates and eat pizza together on Fridays and maybe go to the movies sometime. He hadn’t necessarily considered that there’d be a reason Lio wouldn’t want that, except of course if he just wasn’t interested in him personally.

Galo wants Lio to be safe and happy and well fed, but there’s only so much he can do for him if he doesn’t even want that for himself. 

Lio leans his head back over the back of the couch. He closes his eyes, and his neck is thin and vulnerable. His pale hair delicately reaches just above his eyelashes. Galo admires the shape of his slightly parted lips. 

“I’m just gonna be homeless again next year anyway,” he says, finally. He idly rubs his thumb over the pipe. “I only know how to be Burnish. I don’t know how to just, I don’t know, smile and get someone their coffee.” 

He still doesn’t open his eyes. His exposed throat moves as he swallows.

“I don’t have work history,” he says. “I don’t have a highschool degree. And I don’t have the promare to protect me anymore.”

Galo can only stare blankly at him. The gold light of the lamp grows starker as it darkens from evening to night outside. The sky is slowly becoming black. Most of Lio’s form, which is thin and small under grey sweatpants and one of Galo’s old T-shirt’s, is draped in shadows. 

The lamp light blankets the square bones of his hands and his long fingers, but doesn’t quite make it all the way up to his face. His cheeks look so much sharper and more hollow than they are, lit like a horror movie. 

“My legs and arms hurt all the time from where they turned to ash. I’m constantly freezing and nauseous. I can’t sleep or eat without getting high first,” he says. “I want to help the other Burnish but I don’t know if I can even get out of bed every day reliably.” 

He takes a deep breath and bites down on his lip, peeling up the dry skin. His fingers still slide over the glass piece in his hand. 

“This isn’t who I’m supposed to be,” he says. “I’m sorry. I feel like I’m not even the person you saved anymore. I’m really sorry, Galo Thymos.” 

Galo frowns, his jaw tight and stressed. 

“You’re still you,” he tells him firmly. “You still have it in you somewhere, even if you need to take some time to find it again.” 

Lio swallows hard again. He doesn’t move from where he sits. The lamp catches glints of wetness on his darkly lit face. He stares straight up at the ceiling. 

“I’m sorry,” he says again. His throat is strained. “I still just want to smoke with you. We were having a really good time.” 

Galo feels his own breathing pick up, coming out harder through his nose. Lio is incredibly still. 

“It’s okay,” Galo says. “I still meant it when I said I love you. I always mean what I say. And you’re not gonna be homeless again, because my couch is always gonna be there for you.” 

There is a pause while that statement hangs in the air. It’s heavy and unyielding between the two of them. 

Lio finally moves, just to turn his head to the side, away from the light so Galo can’t see. He wraps his arms tightly around his middle and pulls his feet up onto the couch. 

“I’m still sorry,” he says again.

He frees up one of his hands, putting the black bag into the other with the pipe for a second, cradling them both against his chest. He firmly wipes off his face.

Then he sits up. He crouches on the cushion, leaning over the table. He puts down the pipe and pulls a grinder out of the fanny pack. 

“You shouldn’t be sorry,” Galo says. “You’re not someone who should be sorry.” 

“That’s what I mean,” he says, pulling a wrapped up ziplock bag out of the black drawstring one. “Just let me pack this. I feel sick.”

Galo is quiet. He doesn’t move, yet, from his side of the couch. He watches Lio carefully pick out little bits of green from the bag with the tips of his fingers. He is being painfully particular.

They both sit in silence as he seems to pick out each and every nug to examine individually. Galo eyes the remote and wonders if it would be alright to turn on the TV. They don’t have cable, but he knows Lio, Gueira and Meis all use his Netflix account. 

“Are we actually going to smoke or are you just going to look at your weed indefinitely?” Galo says, laughing and hoping he laughs too. 

“Shut up,” he says, thankfully smiling, however reluctantly. “I want this to be really good, because this is still a date.” 

Galo laughs. 

“Lio Fotia, pajama clad master of romance,” he snickers. 

“They’re not pajamas. They’re joggers,” he insists. 

“You’re not jogging!”

Lio hushes him, smirking, and Galo accepts that he’s just going to have to be patient. After a period of time Galo swears could’ve potentially reached a full half hour, Lio finishes his arduous task. He sits up on the couch and crawls over to place himself in Galo’s lap. He fits perfectly on his thigh, sharp shoulders pressing against his chest. 

He pecks a quick kiss on Galo’s face before holding the pipe up to his mouth for him. 

“Here,” he says. 

Galo brings his hands up to take it from him, but he doesn’t let go of it.

“Let me light it for you,” he says, flicking the pink lighter in his other hand. The bright gold glow only lasts for a moment. Lio leans his head on his shoulder. 

Galo breathes in deeply and holds for a moment, before guiding Lio’s hand to pull it away from his mouth. He exhales over his other shoulder. 

“Wow, you’re so romantic,” he says, possibly less sarcastically than he’d like to admit. 

Lio kisses his jaw without responding. 

“Do you want to put on a movie?” Galo asks. 

“Yeah, you can pick whatever,” Lio says, taking the next hit for himself and visibly trying not to cough. 

The rest of the evening is slow and quiet. They spend a long time trying to decide on a movie, with nothing seeming too particularly enticing. When they are finished passing the bowl back and forth, Lio momentarily leaves to get the comforter from his bedroom. 

He tosses it over Galo as he lies on the couch. 

“Oh. Thank you,” he mumbles. He doesn’t move to take it off, just accepting that the world is dark now. 

He is lost, quietly, in his thoughts for an indefinite amount of time. He hears mechanical humming and vaguely registers it as a microwave. Eventually, the meager lamplight returns to envelope him, and cold air breezes over his face as Lio pulls the blanket back off of him. They still haven’t picked a movie to watch. 

Lio sets plates down with the leftover burgers from earlier that day and tosses a bag of chips down with them. They slightly obscure the TV from where Galo is laying. 

The next thing Lio does is messily lie down on top of him. The warm and soft pressure of the weight of his body falls onto his shoulders. The minty smell of his deodorant lingers sweetly with the scent of his sweat, and his hair tickles his face. He moans tiredly into Galo’s ear and lays his face on the side of his neck. 

Galo smiles tiredly, and realizes his eyes are closed. 

“Do you want dinner?” Lio mumbles, laughing softly. His voice is low in his chest. 

Galo rolls over, causing Lio to slip down off of him and onto the couch. Galo sinks back into the crevice between and back and the cushions, and Lio lays closely next to him. 

“Yeah, I want dinner.” 

He wraps his arms around him and pats his shoulder a few times. Lio sits up first. 

“We still haven’t picked a movie,” Galo says, pushing himself up after him and patting his shoulder some more. 

Lio sits in his lap and hands him his partially eaten burger from earlier. He takes a few bites of it. 

“Did you microwave these?” 

Lio takes a few bites of his own burger. After a significant amount of silence and after he’s swallowed about half the burger, he responds.

“Oh, is that why it’s even more disgusting than earlier?” 

Galo takes another bite of the burger. 

“It’s still cold. I don’t think you microwaved these,” he says.

“Oh,” Lio says. “Fuck.” 

They both eat them together in silence, regardless. 

“You need to pick a movie,” Lio insists again, patting his thigh roughly. 

“Alright!” Galo says, shoving the last of the burger into his mouth. He puts the empty plate down on the coffee table. Just then, however, he hears the click of a lock and the opening of the apartment door. 

The sound is followed by footsteps, clamor, and loud conversation. For a moment, he forgets who’s apartment he’s actually in and cannot fathom who that could be. However, the dimly lit silhouettes of Gueira and Meis soon wander into the living room light. 

“Aw fuck there’s a light in here.”

“Oh I forgot we got a lamp!”

“Aw fuck and there’s people in here too!” 

“Oh I forgot we got a Lio’s boyfriend!” 

The two of them sneak quietly through the living room and toward the kitchen, still carrying on in their conversation. One of them flicks on the kitchen light and it brightens the living room just a little more. 

Lio picks up the chips off the table and uncurls the bag. Galo stares into the kitchen, watching the other two men quietly open up the cupboards and fridge and start to chat. 

“Lio? Did you go shopping yet?” Gueira calls from the kitchen. 

Lio doesn’t respond to them and instead keeps eating his chips and staring at the Netflix menu. 

“Boss!” Meis yells, more fervently. 

“What?” He calls back. 

Meis wanders out of the kitchen. He stands in front of them, looking down at the couch. His boots are heavy on the apartment floor and he hasn’t taken off his jacket. His hair is long and shiny, haloed by the light of the kitchen. 

“We’re gonna go shopping, do you and Galo wanna come?” 

He briefly glances at Galo to meet his eyes. He smiles quickly. 

“Uhm…” is all Lio says. He eats a few more chips. 

“I’ll go shopping if you want to go,” Galo says to Lio. 

“Like grocery shopping?” He asks. 

Gueira walks up behind Meis to join him in staring down at the two of them.

“Don’t interrupt his date!” he says. 

“I’m not! I’m just asking if he went to the store or not yet and if he wants to come with us!” 

“Well then we’d be interrupting his cute date and he’d be fucking grocery shopping with us!”

“I’m inviting Galo too!” 

Galo starts to stare at the netflix menu again. 

“Yeah do you wanna go to the store? I want soda,” Lio finally responds. 

“Yeah, that’s fine with me,” Galo says. 

“Okay cool,” Meis says. “Also it reeks in here.” 

Galo pats Lios shoulder, but he doesn’t move from where he is. He pats his cheek. 

“Come on big boss!!” He says. “I gotta get my shoes. We gotta get more chips!” 

“Alright,” Lio groans, finally hauling himself out of Galo’s lap. He walks off into his room to get his things. 

Galo stands up and stretches. He’s sort of glad to be taller than Gueria and Meis again. He doesn’t want Lio to know that he’s still a little intimidated by them on some level. He walks over to the pile of shoes beside the door and slips on his sneakers. 

The three of them wait patiently for Lio to return, although Galo is becoming more aware of the deep, aching hunger in his stomach that that leftover burger did nothing to fix. Eventually, he re-emerges in jeans and a sweatshirt, tugging on a leather jacket. 

Galo is vaguely aware that Lio uses his body as support as he slips on his boots. 

The four of them proceed on their late night walk to the supermarket together, with Meis and Gueira chatting a few feet ahead of Lio and Galo. Lio keeps his fingers laced tightly around Galo’s. He occasionally presses his face into his partner’s sleeve. 

“I wanna kiss you on the mouth,” he whispers to him more than once. Galo responds with a laugh each time. 

“I want to kiss you too,” he whispers back. 

“Oh, wow.” 

He snickers into his shoulder. He stops walking for a moment, and strains on his toes to brush a kiss onto Galo’s cheek. They both laugh even harder. 

“Hey, we’re losing you guys! Catch up!” Meis calls after them. 

They both hurry after them into the grocery store parking lot.


	5. Chapter 5

Lio wakes up the next day much warmer than usual. He is buried under two blankets and the weight of someone’s arm. For the first time in years, he might almost be too warm. Almost. 

He doesn’t want to open his eyes, having enjoyed the peacefulness of sleeping far too much. He wants to return to being blissfully unconscious, unaware of his body and comfortably safe in someone else’s arms. He doesn’t remember his dreams, today, which means they at least hadn’t been nightmares. 

When he does let his eyes open, when he finally accepts that they aren’t going to stay shut anymore, he stares into Galo’s chest. The morning light is cool and gentle from his bedroom window. The world is utterly and completely quiet, with just the distant hum of cars and Galo’s peaceful breathing. 

As his consciousness becomes more solid, though, a dull ache starts to bloom in his legs and wrists and he starts to wish he could just go back to sleep. He buries his face into Galo’s shirt, and brings his arm over his ribs to pull himself closer, until he is pressed flush against his stomach. 

He closes his eyes again, hoping he’ll just fall back to sleep. Hoping Galo doesn’t wake up. Hoping the nausea is his stomach is just hunger he can shake off for now, and that they can just lay here in the morning light indefinitely. 

He hears Galo inhale through his nose, then, and feels him move a bit. Much to Lio’s dismay, his arm moves from his back, and he momentarily rolls over to grab his phone off the nightstand.   
He moves back onto his side in a moment, though, and squints at the light and his phone. 

He sighs and lays it down behind Lio’s head on the pillow. His arm finds its way back around him, his hand safely against his back. Lio feels him press his lips into his forehead, before laying his cheek on his hair. 

“It’s already 10:30,” he whispers quietly. 

Despite this, though, he only holds him tighter. 

Lio groans softly and has no intention of moving to do anything but pull the covers tighter around himself. His movements are precious as the ache in his wrists starts to pulse. 

He brings the blanket up over Galo’s shoulder and over his own face, trying to block out the late morning light. Maybe if he can’t see the day coming, it’ll just back off. 

“I have to go do stuff with Aina today,” Galo mumbles into his hair. He follows it up with a deep sigh. 

His ribs rise and fall in Lio’s grip. He only clutches him tighter. 

“Do you want breakfast first?” Galo asks. “Do you want to go out and get something?” 

Lio smushes his face against his shirt, smiling softly. He’s still not sure if he’s hungry or nauseous. 

“We have eggs,” Lio offers. “I think. And bread.” 

“I can pay for it, if it’s a problem,” Galo says. “We’re still on a date.” 

“Don’t,” Lio says bluntly. “I don’t wanna owe you money.” 

Galo laughs sleepily. “You’re not gonna owe me money for a date.” 

Lio groans and brings his head further under the blanket in response. He still doesn’t want to open his eyes. 

“I can just cook you some eggs,” Lio says. “That’s cute, right? A normal cute date thing?” 

Galo gently strokes the back of his hair. 

“You do this that often?” He asks.

“I’ve seen a few dates in my time,” he says, thinking about several things he doesn’t want to ever talk about with anyone. 

“I’ll cook the eggs,” Galo says. 

Lio smiles into his shirt. He’s still not sure he’s hungry. 

“Okay.”

——

Lio digs the small frying pan out of the pile of dishes in the sink with a clatter. He turns on the water and waits for it to get hot. He stares out the window above the sink at an overcast sky.

Galo sits quietly at the kitchen table. He’s already put back on his jeans and sweatshirt from yesterday. He leans on his hand lazily, his eyes still drifting closed. 

Lio scrubs the pan and watches the wind blow through their neighbor’s tree. 

Galo says something, but he can’t quite understand him over the sink. He rinses the suds off the pan and sets it on the cluttered counter to dry. He rings out the sponge and switches off the faucet.

“Sorry, what?”

He turns to look at him.

“Do you want me to help you do dishes?” He says again. 

Lio shrugs. “No. That’s okay. I’m sorry our house is like this.” 

“No, it’s okay. My house is gross too. I just like helping,” he says, smiling, and getting up. “I’m better at cleaning other people’s houses than my own.” 

He stands next to Lio and pours more soap onto the sponge. 

“Go sit down. It’s fine,” he says, pushing him aside with his hip. 

Lio watches him switch on the water. He is unsure of what he should do. He curls his fingers hesitantly. It shouldn’t be his problem to worry about. 

In the end, though, Lio lets him, albeit with some guilt. However, there was no telling when or if those dishes would ever be done otherwise, so he doesn’t feel like it would be anyone’s best interest to argue. Of course, it would have just been better if the house had already been clean when he’d invited him over. 

He at least finds the paper towel to wipe off the stove while he works on the dishes. He ignores the weak pain in his arms and legs. He finds some spam in the cupboard as well. 

“Okay, go sit. I’ll cook,” he says, momentarily placing his hand on Lio’s waist. 

Lio sighs and stretches.

“Fine,” he says, falling into the kitchen chair. 

He closes his eyes and wishes they were still sleeping. He lays down on his arms on the table, letting himself drift off again. 

He listens to Galo open and close the fridge, and to the soft tinkering of him scrambling eggs in a bowl. The level of peacefulness is almost overwhelming. He feels himself begin to melt, becoming buried in his sweatshirt and blonde hair. 

The eggs sizzle as Galo pours them into the frying pan. 

A twinge of anxiety creeps in. He wonders how long this can last. He knows today that it’s almost over, and that after this Galo will leave and they won’t see each other again until they both have another day off at the same time. But beyond that, he wonders how long things can be this good. It almost feels wrong to enjoy it, for fear of getting too used to it. 

He knows it’ll just hurt too much when it finally ends. But still, he could very easily be dead or in prison right now. There are so many unreasonable odds that played out in his favor that allowed him to be here, on this quiet morning. 

Galo places a plate down on the table in front of him. Lio barely opens his eyes.

He sits down across from him with his own plate and fork. 

“I think I undercooked it but I’m impatient and really hungry. Sorry,” he says, cutting into a spam omelette. 

Lio looks at his own omelette and toast, not quite prepared to sit up. It smells delicious but he’s worried his stomach won’t live with the idea of putting anything in it. 

He picks up a piece of toast to start with, and starts ripping it apart in his fingers. He determines after a few bites that he is, at least, hungry. 

Galo shovels his eggs into his mouth. 

Lio tentatively picks up his fork and cuts into his own. He puts a small bite into his mouth. It’s salty and fatty and, he is right, a little runny in the middle. 

“It’s good,” he says. “Thank you.” 

He eats very slowly. Galo is finished with his eggs in just a few bites, before moving on to his toast. 

“I told Aina I’d hang out with her today, but I’ll still text you later.” he says. “We can hang out again later this week if you want.” 

“Mmm. Okay,” Lio mumbles, putting another bite into his mouth. 

“We can go to my place if you want. I can cook you bacon and hash browns too,” he smiles.

Lio smiles warmly. 

“Okay,” He says. He puts his fork down and returns to his toast, starting to feel too sick to finish the eggs. “I’d love that.” 

They eat together for a few more minutes, but altogether too soon, Galo is sighing and groaning, saying he has to go. He gets up from the table. Lio follows him as he goes to put on his shoes. 

“I’ll text you later,” he assures. 

“Okay,” Lio says. “I’m probably going to nap.” 

“Okay. Have fun,” he says, putting his hands down on his shoulders. He leans over and Lio cranes his neck to kiss him goodbye. 

Then Galo leaves and Lio locks the door behind him. 

He stares at the white chipping paint and the crooked handle. He wishes they were still sleeping. 

He goes back to sit at the empty kitchen table and tries, again, to eat his omelette. It’s cold now, which strangely makes it easier to swallow. 

He is only alone in the silence for a few minutes, though, before Meis comes to get a soda from the fridge. He sits down in the chair opposite Lio, and puts his legs up on the third chair. 

“How’s it going, Boss?” He says, popping the can open.

Lio pushes what’s left of his omelette around on the plate. Even though Galo is already gone, he still feels like he should finish it. 

“Galo made me breakfast,” he says. “But he just left.”

“Oh, jeez. That’s pretty serious,” Meis smirks, taking a sip.

The omelette looks so good. He’s sure it would be good at any other time in his life. He stabs it gingerly with the fork.

He slowly puts another bite into his mouth and immediately regrets it. As he chews, he feels dangerously close to gagging. He just tells himself, urgently, to ignore how it feels and just swallow it and then it’ll be over. You just have to swallow and it’ll be over, come on-

“Is he that bad of a cook?” Meis remarks at his struggling facial expressions.

He finally swallows, horribly.

“No. It’s good,” he says. “I just feel sick.” 

“Well, then stop eating it,” Meis says. “He’s not even here.” 

Lio lays the fork on the plate. There’s still another bite left, but he pushes the entire thing away toward Meis. 

“I don’t know. You can have it if you want,” he says. 

Meis just shrugs. He picks up the fork and stabs what remains on the plate. He doesn’t hesitate to put it into his mouth. 

“So I’m guessing you’re still not feeling better?” He asks with his mouth full. 

“No,” he says. 

Meis swallows. 

“Hmm. Gueira’s still a little foggy too,” he says. “He went in for work before you got up, though.”

Lio hums. 

“Does he like being a line cook? I feel like I haven’t seen him,” he asks. 

“No,” he says shortly. “But what else is there?” 

“I don’t know. Did you hear back from-“

“No.”

“Oh.”

They sit in silence for a moment. Meis pushes the empty plate back toward him. He takes another sip of his soda. 

His eyes are even more tired than usual. He’s always had a thin face and rough skin, but he still looks as exhausted as everyone else. Everyone Lio knows seems to just look dead. Everything feels like another, emptier, weird world.

He misses being able to just go and ride with them. The three of them weren’t meant to live in the house like this. He hopes he can get his hands on a motorcycle soon, at least. Maybe he’d feel less dead. 

“Did you do all the dishes?” Meis asks.

“No, Galo offered so I let him,” Lio says.

“Oh, wow that’s really serious,” he responds, eyes wide and mouth smirking. His voice is smooth and even. “You must’ve made a pretty good impression.” 

Lio leans back down on his arms, pushing his face into the sleeves of his sweatshirt. 

“We didn’t even do that much,” he says. “He fingered me and I sucked him off but that’s it.” 

Meis laughs. 

“He seems sweet. A little naive, but…” He shrugs. “If you keep him, I think he’s alright. I think he’s scared of me though.” 

Lio smiles. “I’m not sure he really gets everything yet,” he says. “He could throw me across a room, though, so…” 

They both laugh together for a burst. Then Lio groans, putting his head down on the table. 

“I should’ve told him I can’t eat,” he says, standing up urgently. He moves to lean over the sink, just in case. “I didn’t want to make him sad. He really wanted to make me eggs.” 

Meis snorts and takes another drink. 

“I feel like my body is going to start falling apart,” Lio says. “I’m gonna like, accidentally bite off one of my fingers or something and it’s gonna be all downhill from there. My ear lobes will become artifacts of a different time. You’re gonna have to shoot me in a warehouse.” 

Meis sighs. Lio hears the scraping of the chair as he gets up. He walks over to lean against the sink next to him. He is close enough that their shoulders touch. He smells familiarly of tobacco.

“Is it getting worse?” He asks, more seriously. 

“I don’t know. I don’t think so,” he says. “Is it getting worse for you?” 

“I think it’s about the same,” he says. He pulls a pack of cigarettes out of his back pocket. “It’s not getting any better, though.” 

Lio closes his eyes. He wishes he’d just throw up. He’d feel better after if he could just actually throw up. 

“I’m gonna go have a smoke if you wanna join me,” he says. He pats him on the back, and he realizes he’s shivering again. 

“Sure.” 

Lio goes with him to lean on the rail of the small wooden balcony. He stares down at the car parked just below them, and the backs of the surrounding apartment buildings. He squints just a bit in the rising late morning light. 

Meis offers Lio a cigarette, and he takes it tentatively. He holds it unlit in his fingers. 

Meis holds his own cigarette between his teeth and cups his hands around his lighter. Lio watches with strange longing as he flicks a little orange flame into a brief existence. He can almost swear he hears familiar cries, echoing in the back of his mind, wanting for more and more.

Without it, though, that quick little flame feels so strange and empty. It’s eerie to watch him light a cigarette that way. It’s sad to see a flame so quiet. 

He takes a quick drag and exhales a stream of smoke. 

“So,” he says. “Gueira’s gonna want to talk to you too, but I’ve got my own piece.” 

Lio is a little perturbed by the statement, but doesn’t show it. He places his own cigarette, unlit, in his mouth and pulls his lighter from his back pocket.

“Things aren’t ever gonna be the same,” Meis says. “They just aren’t. We’re scattered and out of our depth.” 

He takes a pause, staring out at the parking lot.

“And, I know it’s not my place to say this. You’re the one who gets final say, and you know it’s ride or die for us,” he says. “But we're the only ones left, and there’s no telling what they’re gonna do to me and Gueira, even if you get pardoned.” 

Lio tentatively flicks his lighter, just to stare at the quiet flame. He’s only getting more nauseous by the second. He already knows what he’s talking about. Lio has thought about it too. 

“I wanna say this as your general, first, which is that I think you’re a real admirable person. You know what you want, and you know what you care about, and you’re fearless about everything you do.” 

He takes another drag, and exhales out of the corner of his mouth. 

“And you’re incredibly capable of love,” he says. “Everything you do and say feels like ferocious love. It’s something I’ve never seen anyone brave enough to do, especially in this business.” 

Lio looks at the perfectly blue sky and feels himself getting colder. 

“And I want you to know I’ve never respected anyone more as a leader,” he says. “I know you know that, though.” 

Lio flicks the lighter again, bringing a tall orange flame to the tip of his cigarette. 

“But I also wanna talk to you, as someone who knows you, and who has been there with you for at least a few years now.” 

Meis takes another long drag. He hesitates to continue to speak, and lets it burn between his fingers. 

Lio inhales, letting the smoke sting his throat and warm him from the inside. 

“I could never mean you any disrespect when I say this, and I’d never bring it up any other time,” Meis says. “I know you’re an adult, and an accomplished guy, I mean really accomplished, but you’re also still a kid.” 

Lio exhales. 

“And you have a chance to be a kid,” he says. “You have a chance to take the rest of your 20s, and the rest of your life, and do whatever you want with it. 

You can kiss that burning rescue guy. You can fucking marry him if you want to. Or someone else. Whoever you want.” 

He pauses. He swallows. Lio keeps staring at the clear blue sky until his eyes sting. 

“But Gueira and I can’t go back,” he says. “We want to live the rest of our lives too, but we can’t have what you can.” 

Lio’s throat tightens. 

“And if we’re all that remains of the Mad Burnish,” Meis says. “Then it might be best if we let the gang go, you know? Let it live on in its legacy. And it might be best if me and Gueira disappear with it.” 

Lio puts the cigarette between his lips and looks to the side, down the long line of balconies and brick. 

“Now, it won’t be right away,” he says. 

Lio stares at the way the sun cuts across the apartment building. 

“But it might be for a long time.” 

The way the very tip of the building is bright against the bluest sky he’s seen in weeks. 

“It might even be forever.” 

The sun starts to burn his eyes. 

“And I want you to know it’s okay for you to just be a kid for now. It’s okay for you to stop, and rest, and take your time. Because I sure as fuck never did, and I think you deserve it more than anyone at this point.” 

Lio pulls the cigarette out of his mouth. He leans over the railing. His face is suddenly soaked and dripping. He takes a deep shuddering breath. 

He tries to focus on the parking lot, on the sun shining off the old cars, or the cluster of crows by the dumpster. But his vision is underwater and his mind will not wonder for anything else.

There is nothing at all left for him to think. There are only emotions left, demanding to be felt. He’s already thought about this. He’s already silently reeled about this, and wondered how to bring it up himself. 

He never could’ve asked them to leave. The decision would’ve been theirs to make anyway.

He wishes he was still asleep. 

He stares at the sunny pavement and puts a hand on Meis shoulder. He collects himself enough to speak.

He takes another deep breath. He knows who he is, and how to do this. 

“As a leader, I am going to leave the decision to stay or go up to you,” he says shakily. “I would love for the Mad Burnish to carry on as an activist group, and a source of protection, and for us to continue to do what we can.” 

He tightens his grip. His tears drip onto the railing. 

“And I know I’ll keep up with protecting others, somehow,” he says. “And I would love to have you by my side. And I promise I would never let anything happen to you if I could help it.” 

He swallows. 

“But, as your friend, and as Lio and not as the Boss of Mad Burnish…” 

The cigarette in his fingers just keeps burning down smaller and smaller, just brushing his lips.

“I want you to live however you want. I want you to be free to go wherever you need to,” he says. “You’ve done more for me than I could ever ask, and I trust your decisions. I just hope that one day I can come find you again.” 

Meis wraps an arm tightly around his shoulders and pulls him in close to his ribs. He rubs his hand up and down his arm. 

“You’ve done the most ridiculous shit I’ve ever seen,” Meis says. “I know you’re gonna keep doing great shit.” 

The tears won’t stop flooding down his face. 

“And I know you’re gonna take good care of yourself,” he says, sternly. “So you can live a long time and accomplish everything you want to do.” 

He takes his hand back, and they both lean on the balcony in the sun. 

Something stirs inside Lio, something he’s quite thankful for. Amongst his grief is a memory of who he is. He knows he is loved, and that he can be cared for in his new bizarre and aching body. But he also knows he knows how to care for other people. And he knows he’s still stronger than he feels, even now. He knows that he knows what to do. 

“Do you need more money?” He asks. 

Meis doesn’t answer him. 

“Because we haven’t checked everywhere yet,” he says. “Most of our assets were raided and seized, but we still have a few places we can check.” 

Meis takes a few puffs. 

“Since we have to play nice and pay rent, and it’s draining us fast.” 

He thinks. 

“We’d need bikes to get out there,” Meis says. 

“We can get bikes,” Lio says 

“Okay.”

“We’ll talk to Gueira later.” 

Lio stands up and wipes off his face. His legs and feet bristle with pain and numbness.

“I think that guy likes me too much,” he says, smiling. “And I think I’m getting too used to it.” 

Meis laughs. 

“I don’t want to scare him off. I think I like him too much too,” he continues. “I feel like a different person lately. I hope I’m not failing you and Gueira.” 

He leans back and stretches his arms above his head in hopes to maybe relieve some of the stiffness and aches. 

“Our lives are changing,” Meis says simply. “And I’m happy for you.” 

Lio lets his arms fall and swing at his sides. He takes another drag.

“We’ll get you two what you need, though,” he assures. “I don’t want you to worry about anything after this. You deserve peace too.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There was gonna be something in between this but I cant live right now and just want to write fluff im sorry. Maybe I will find a clever way to write about what Galo and Aina did hanging out and squeeze it in after this. Anyway this has less and less to do with promare every day and i do not care orville peck has infected me with gay "lie in the grass and make out" disease

“Yeah, so this is where I come to scream now,” Galo says, stretching his arms above his head. 

This lake is much smaller than the previous frozen reservoir, but it did take quite a drive and a hike out to get here. It’s up so high in the mountains that your ears pop when you’re about halfway there, with no more peaks on the horizon above you besides Fennel Volcano.

Pine trees stand tall against the blue sky, and the water gently laps at the cluster of boulders they’re standing on. All the insects and frogs are loud and buzzing in the humidity. There are two dragonflies fighting in the cattails. 

Lio watches a salamander dart through a shallow pool between a few smaller rocks. He takes a drink from his water bottle. 

“It’s very pretty,” he says, crouching down on the rock.

He watches tall grass sway where the lake turns to marsh. It is very sweet and peaceful here. It would be better if he wasn’t so sweaty. Or if he were at all used to the sensation. He tries not to get overwhelmed by the uncomfortable damp feeling on his back and forehead. 

“Yeah! So, you wanna go swimming?” Galo asks, tossing his backpack against a tree.

“You can swim here?” Lio asks.

“Yeah. I mean, I dunno. I do,” he shrugs. He starts pulling off his sneakers.

Lio takes another sip from his water bottle.

“Do Burnish go swimming?” Galo asks, tucking his shoes and socks against his backpack. “Can burnish get wet?” 

“I take showers,” Lio says, constantly unprepared for the shit this guy thinks sometimes. 

“Well, you do now, but…” he says, starting to take off his T-shirt. “Sorry, that was a dumb thing to say.” 

Lio shrugs and clicks his tongue, still crouching and watching the water. 

“Do Lio Fotias go swimming?” He asks instead.

“Hmm. Not since I was a kid,” he says. “When I lived in Michigan.”

Galo laughs. “You’re from Michigan?” 

“Yeah.”

He laughs even harder.

“Why is that funny?”

“I don’t know,” he says, smiling. “Cause it’s fucking Michigan. I dunno. Do people from Michigan go swimming?” 

“Yeah, most of the state is lakes,” he says.

“Oh yeah. I forgot.” 

Galo starts to carefully climb down the pile of boulders in only his shorts, testing his balance on the smaller rocks under the water. 

“I used to go swimming in lakes when I was a kid too, when I was in girl scouts,” Galo says. 

“Oh, I did that for a little bit in 5th grade,” Lio says.

“Oh that’s cool. My mom was our troop leader so we did it up until the house fire,” he says. “Then everything was weird and I didn’t get to anymore. Also I realized I was a boy.” 

Lio watches him slowly walk further into the water, up until it’s around his ankles. He wonders if it would be cold or refreshing. It is hot out, but his legs were feeling good enough today that they were able to come out here and do this, and he’s worried if he gets cold they’ll just start hurting again. 

“My mom was really cool,” Galo says. “I always remember her laughing super loud in our kitchen during troop meetings.” 

Lio folds his arms over his knees and leans his chin on his wrist. Every time Galo talks about his parents, he feels a little extra aching malice toward that man. 

It’s a strange cocktail of feelings. Lio knows what it’s like to awaken as a Burnish, and to panic, and to accidentally cause irreparable harm, and he would tell any other Burnish on earth, very sternly, that they still have the chance to be good no matter what they did when they first burned. But the anger comes with everything he did after, and the way he lied to Galo. 

He couldn’t imagine, on any level, killing some poor kid’s parents and then pretending to take credit for saving him. And then on top of that, hating the kid whose parents you killed just for liking you. And then going even further as to try and get him killed too, just for being, what? Loud? Excitable? Admiring you and your fake accomplishments?  
He was thoroughly convinced that man was incapable of feeling anything. Or at least, had carefully forgotten how at some point in his life. It was something that felt naively understated whenever he tried to articulate it out loud. It was a feeling that was so obvious and deathly frustrating that no words were adequate. 

Lio’s nails dig into the sleeves of his shirt. It’s a red flannel that Galo let him borrow for the trip. It smells just like his apartment and Lio remembers not to get too angry.

“You gonna come in too?” Galo asks, turning around with the water up to his knees. “It’s a little cold but… What are you looking at me like that for?”

Lio realizes his face is tightly scrunched and his jaw is clenched. He blinks a few times and relaxes his eyes. He pushes a hand through his hair.

“Sorry,” he says. “It’s not you. I was just thinking about something.”

He supposes he shouldn’t get so upset whenever he talks about his parents. It’s probably unfair to him. He seems to only bring them up out of joy.

“Well, come on, take your shoes off at least!” he says, kicking a splash toward him. The water only just reaches him in the form of a shower of droplets. It feels nice and cool on his face.

‘Nice and cool’ was not a sentiment he ever thought he’d have. 

He stands up and stretches his back with a hand on his hip. 

“I’ll think about it.” 

Galo wades further into the water, waves from each of his strides flowing up against the rocks.

“Is it even deep enough to swim in?” Lio calls to him as he gets further out, still with the water only coming up to his thighs. 

“It was last year!” he yells back. “It might not have rained enough!”

Lio drops his backpack on the ground and steps on the backs of his running shoes to tug them off. He sets them neatly in the grass with his socks, then tosses off the flannel. He hesitates before also taking off his t-shirt and adding it to the pile. He rolls up his jeans to the middle of his calf. 

He tentatively climbs down the rocks, carefully checking each one with the tips of his toes to make sure it isn’t slippery or loose. When he finally touches the gently sloshing water, it’s freezing. He snaps back away and shakes it off. Then he tries again. 

“It’s cold!” he yells. 

He briefly looks up to see Galo sitting down in the water, apparently having given up on it being deep enough for swimming. 

“I believe in you!” he calls back at him. “You can do this!”

He submerges his foot in the icy lake water, finding the soft muck underneath. He supposes, against the heat that is apparently enough to make him sweat, and feels strangely like it’s almost burning on his back and face, that it does actually feel nice. His body feels so foreign to him lately.

He tucks his hair behind his ears and steps carefully through the mud and water, watching a few grey fish swim out of his way. A few leaves brush over his feet and he tries to pretend it isn’t unpleasant. The cold water gets up to the edge of his rolled up pants and he stops. He stands still with his arms crossed over his naked chest. 

He looks up at Galo, still sitting in the water, who brings his hands together to clap sarcastically at him. The sound echoes across over the lake. A few birds fly away.

“You’re doing so good!” 

His voice is loud in the relative silence of the forest. 

“If I go any further, my pants will get wet,” he says.

Galo spreads his arms wide and shrugs, still sitting down on the lake floor in his shorts, the water coming up to his bare chest. 

“We’re already passed that,” he says.

Lio supposes it doesn’t matter, somehow. 

He takes a few more steps forward, letting the water come up over the edge of his jeans. 

“Yes! Yeah! Yeah! Go!” Galo cheers after him. 

Lio bites back a smile and tightens his arms around his chest. 

“How are you not cold?” Lio calls to him. 

“It’s so hot out!” Galo responds. 

He leans back on his hands, squinting in the sun with his mouth in a half smile. The light is burning bright on his face, glinting off the wetness on his chest. Lio wonders if he’s allowed to stare at him yet. He’s eaten him out. Are they close enough that he can just stare at him whenever he wants yet? 

He trudges through the cold water as it slowly draws up to his thighs. He supposes it doesn’t feel quite as cold as it initially did. When he finally gets to where Galo is sitting, the water is above his hips. 

“Yeah, you made it!” Galo says, beaming up at him.

Lio stares down at him, and then tentatively tries to sit down in the water. However, as soon as the icy water touches the edge of his ribs, his breath hitches and he quickly decides against it.

“I forgot you’re so short,” Galo says calmly. The water is so clear and glittering in the sun around him. 

“Aren’t you cold?” Lio says again. 

“Nah, it’s hot out,” he says again.

Then he leans back and submerges his head under the water, laying back with his fingers pinched around his nose until he’s floating just above the lake bed. He holds himself there for just a moment before tearing himself back out of the water with a gasp. He drags himself to his feet again, splashing water everywhere and pushing his hair back away from his face. 

Before Lio can even think, one of Galo’s hands are on his waist and the other plunges into the water to grab behind his knees, and then he’s being lifted into his arms. Lio gasps, or shrieks. 

“Don’t you fucking throw me or I’ll literally-” 

“I’m not gonna throw you!” He laughs. “Why would I throw you!? There’s rocks everywhere!”

“I don’t know!” 

However, he does proceed to toss him over his shoulder for absolutely no reason.

“Sorry, you’re just so easy to lift,” he says. “You are so small, like a baby.” 

Lio looks down at Galo’s back, his fingers trying to hold his sun-warmed skin. He carries him as he trudges back toward the rocks, dragging a splash with every step. He feels like he shouldn’t find this a little bit cute. He feels like he should be really upset about this. He feels like he should feel weak by comparison, not endeared by how strong he is.

“Do you wanna have lunch?” Galo asks him, pulling him back off of his shoulder to hold him in his arms. Lio’s heart lurches with the movement. 

“Sure-”

Then Galo leans, still firmly holding Lio in his arms, to dip him upside down until his hair brushes the surface of the lake. He holds his breath very tightly, not completely trusting him not to drop him.

“What the fuck are you doing?” 

“Baptizing you. Anyway… You weigh, what, like four, maybe five pounds?”

“Galo-”

Then he pulls him back up and plants a quick, hard, kiss on his cheek. Lio’s whole body is completely rigid. Galo finally walks all the way back to the rocks and carefully places Lio back onto his feet. He doesn’t let go of him until he’s completely sure he has a solid foothold, thankfully. 

They both climb back onto the rocks and grass, and Galo retrieves a towel from his backpack for them to sit on. Lio unwraps the turkey sandwich he’d brought with him. It is cut into triangles. He takes a bite

“You’re getting a sunburn,” Galo tells him, biting into his own sandwich. “Or you’re just blushing from my incredible charm, which is also understandable.” 

“What?” He says just before bringing a hand up to scratch his face, and finding it to cause a burning sensation to erupt on his skin. “Ouch-”

“Do Burnish not need sunscreen?” Galo asks. “Or is that people from Michigan? Or just Fotias?”

“People from Michigan don’t get sunburns because we don’t go outside because it’s Michigan out there,” he says.

Galo reaches behind him to grab Lio’s t-shirt from his pile. He tosses it into his lap.

“Your shoulders are pretty bad too,” he remarks. 

Lio holds what’s left of his sandwich quarter in his mouth and slips his shirt back on. It stings a little bit as it lays down on his skin. It’s a sensation he hasn’t felt in at least ten years. He bites off the part of the sandwich still held in his mouth.

“And Fotias don’t get sunburns because they are just me,” he says. “It’s not the name my parents had.” 

“Put this back on too,” Galo says, tossing him the flannel as well. “Oh, really? Hmm. Were they that bad?”

Lio slips the button down around his shoulders. The added weight stings a little more. He wasn’t even shirtless for that long. 

“No, I just, uh…” He thinks about the least alarming way to say this. “I don’t want them to be associated with me, for a lot of reasons. Partly for their safety and, uh, partly, because I think they think I am dead and also a girl.” 

Galo takes a drink from his water bottle. 

“Oh.”

Lio takes another bite.

“It’s complicated.”

There is a pause while they both eat.

“Do you think you’d ever want to like, find them again?” Galo asks.

Lio sighs and thinks for a second. 

“I don’t know. I think about it sometimes,” is all he says. “I don’t know if they’d be happy with me or not.”

“They might be happy you’re alive,” Galo says.

“I’ll find them again someday,” he agrees. “I’m sure they haven’t gone far from where they were.” 

Galo sighs and slumps his shoulders a bit.

“It was probably a hard decision,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

“Mmm…” Lio hums thoughtfully. He swallows back years and years of his life threatening to bubble up into his throat.

He has to shove it further away, now. He groans loudly and lets himself fall backward into the grass. He stretches his legs out on either side of the towel their lunch is on. Then he sighs or groans or maybe yells loudly.

“Are you okay?” Galo asks.

He doesn’t respond right away and takes another bite of his sandwich instead. All his muscles and organs feel like they're writhing with anxiety. 

“You should kiss me again,” he states bluntly after a moment. He squints at the trees stretching up into the sky above him. He listens to the cicadas whine in the distance. 

Galo is silent and Lio isn’t sure what he’s doing. He hopes that wasn’t too forward. He’s half joking but he hopes he obliges him. He hasn’t moved quite yet, though. 

“Should I?” he asks. 

Lio just hums and finishes another quarter of his sandwich. He swallows and closes his eyes. The grass prickles the back of his neck. He stretches his arms above his head. 

He hears Galo get up, his footsteps soft in the grass. Then he feels him sit down next to him. He hears the grass crunch and his shadow blocks some of the sun gleaming through his eyelids. Then he feels his lips brush his own and feels his breath on his nose.

He holds him in a solid kiss for a moment, before pushing against the corner of his mouth. He feels his weight press against his side as his fingers lightly brush his jaw. He feels his tongue brush his lips, and he opens his mouth a bit more to kiss him back. 

He hears him sigh low in his chest. 

They both take a short breath together, before he finds the inside of his mouth again. Galo’s hand quickly slips its way up under his t-shirt to brush against his ribs. It feels electric. Lio makes the smallest sound of approval into his mouth.

Galo pulls his lips away and rests his head on the grass, his cheek against Lio’s hair. His fingers continue to trail across his stomach under his shirt. He kisses the side of his face. 

Lio reaches around his neck with his arms, pressing his fingers against his warm back, trying to coax him closer. He kisses him hard on the mouth. 

“You should keep going,” Lio says.

“Other people hike up here sometimes,” Galo whispers.

“Hmm. That’s sad,” he says. He brings his fingers down Galo’s arm, until he’s able to hold his hand and guide it lower. “You should be quick. Or I’ll be quick, whichever.”

He feels him push his lips and teeth into his jaw. His hand follows where he’d guided and Lio’s breath hitches as he gently teases at his waist band. His fingers softly caress the crest of his hips. Lio’s heart beats hard and hot in his chest.

His hand moves over his jeans, which are still damp, unfortunately. He presses his palm down over his crotch. Lio sighs. He pulls him even closer and kisses him even deeper. 

“Is this what you mean?” he mumbles deeply into his mouth, his hand massaging over his jeans. 

Lio hums his approval, teeth and tongue already too busy on the side of his face.

“Is this usually what you mean when you want me to kiss you?” he laughs softly.

Lio takes a deep breath, dragging all of Galo in with it, pulling him toward his chest. His fingers respond by pushing even more firmly against his crotch.

“I was really just thinking you’d give me a quick peck,” he says. 

“Oh,” he says, laughing harder. 

“I’m not gonna argue, though.” he whispers. 

“Are you okay?” he asks, even quieter. “We weren’t exactly having a sexy conversation before this.” 

“Don’t make me think about that,” he says. “Distract me. Please.”

“Okay, we’ll change the subject.” 

He squeezes firmly, almost roughly, against him, and kisses his temple. Then he pulls away long enough to undo the button on his jeans. Lio smiles into his next lazy kiss. He brings his fingers up into his damp hair. 

Galo’s fingers brush against his belly again and his muscles twitch. Then his hand is slipping down into his boxers. His eyes are still sweetly closed and he wonders if he could live in this moment forever. He wonders if he could just braid him into his hair and seep into the ground.

His fingers are warm over his clit and he gasps a little. He’s not that wet, he realizes, though. This was a little bit of a split second decision. There wasn’t much lead up. He’s hot and breathing heavy nonetheless, though. He pulls his fingers along Galo’s jaw, taking his mouth down into his with all his breath and teeth. 

Galo exhales shakily into him, and his lips are a mess on his face. His fingers push and stroke him sweetly. His chest is electric and absolutely vibrating. Every single time he kisses him he thinks about how he’d like to sink into his touch and disappear. Alone up here, especially, with the buzzing cicadas and lapping water and occasional single strumming note of a bullfrog. He thinks he’d like to melt in the sun with him. 

Galo opens his mouth and pushes his teeth into his neck on a low groan. His tongue is hot against him. His lips push like a kiss and then sucks hard at his skin. Lio gasps. It hurts just the smallest bit. He’s glad he’s getting braver. 

He strokes so perfectly between the folds of his flesh. Lio rolls his hips toward his touch, twitching and rocking in the grass with his flimsy-feeling legs. He just wants and wants and wants, empty of any other feeling except for what he thinks must be love. He knows how to love, of course. He knows how to care and be sweet and how to listen and how to kiss. There are a thousand things he’d die for for the sake of love. When was the last time he was in love?

He thinks about how he’d want him to hold him just for warmth. He wonders if that was love. He wonders what that feels like. He wonders if he’s feeling it. He wonders if you’re supposed to be this nauseous. 

He shudders. 

“Galo…” 

“Mmhmm…”

He feels soaking wet, now, and he feels him ease a finger into him. He still hasn’t let go of his mouth. Lio can feel his neck start to tire, though, and he puts both of his hands on his cheeks, coaxing him softly back, just enough so that their lips are only delicately, lazily, achingly brushing. Every little touch is like a livewire against his swollen mouth and tongue.

His ribs are rising and falling under him as he huffs every breath. He momentarily lets his head fall back into the prickly grass. His body starts to weaken, slowly, and he really does feel like he’s sinking into the earth. His touch stays stroking over Galo’s shoulders, however effortlessly. 

He feels him push another finger in, feels him curl them both. He gasps quietly under his mess of hair and closes his eyes tighter. His hips roll gently with him.

“My hand hurts, are you close?” Galo whispers into his neck. 

“No,” he says outright, smiling tiredly. 

“Fuck…” Galo says, and unfortunately, he loses his rhythm. Or at least that’s what Lio thinks at first. Then he pulls his fingers out of him entirely, leaving him quaking and empty. Then Lio hears distant chatter. 

“Fuck…” he agrees. 

The next few moments are like lightning. 

Galo wipes his hand off on the grass. Lio quickly sits up and fastens the button on his pants. Galo finds his shirt and hastily tugs it on, before heading toward the lake. Lio sits up and shoves another piece of his sandwich into his mouth just in time for two hikers to find their way into the clearing. 

A man and a woman in their tank tops and shorts wander through to stand on one of the boulders. They toss them an oblivious hello and a smile each.

“It’s so nice up here!”

Galo rinses his hands in the shallow water. 

“Yeah, it’s beautiful out,” he says quickly.

“Yeah, it’s so sunny,” Lio says, legs still trembling as he eats his sandwich as fast as possible. 

\---

They take that as a good time to find their way back to where they’d parked Galo’s motorcycle. They wander back down the path through the woods. They spend the whole walk in peaceful silence, occasionally taking each other's hands when the path allows it. 

They eventually find the side of the road. Galo hands him his helmet. 

“Do you want to go back to my house or do you want me to take you home?” he asks, putting on his own helmet and swinging his leg over the seat. He leans on the handlebars with his visor up. 

“Hmm. I have nothing to do,” Lio says, climbing up behind him and strapping his own helmet on. His toes balance on the asphalt. 

"You mean besides that massive speech thing tomorrow?" he reminds him.

Lio groans and swallows every bit of his ability to even think. 

“Do you want me to make you breakfast in the morning first?” Galo asks him. 

He sighs hard again. He’d love that and he wants to enjoy it this time. 

“Can we stop at my house for a couple things first?” he asks.

Galo smiles. 

“Sure.”


	7. Chapter 7

Lio waits for Galo to unlock the outside door and shove it open, followed immediately by a screen door that Lio has yet to figure out the trick to. The house smells warm and dusty and faintly like a dog.

This isn’t his first time seeing Galo’s apartment. He’d been here just briefly, on another occasion, when he’d needed to just quickly come here to get something. He hadn’t stepped outside of the yellow kitchen. There were just as many dishes in the sink as last time and just as many recyclables cluttering a little too much of the floor. (All in boxes, of course. There just wasn’t much room in the kitchen.)

He lives on the first floor, with Varys. The kitchen is long and narrow, with wood cabinets and worn out vinyl flooring. Lio takes his shoes off after Galo, leaving them in the pile on the mat at the entrance. He hears the clacking of a dog’s nails walking on hardwood. 

He’s a big fluffy dog of indeterminate breed, and Lio has already been told that he’s pretty relaxed. He just wanders into the kitchen to greet Galo quietly, pushing his nose into his hands and leg. 

Galo mumbles hello to the dog and gently fluffs his neck before moving on through the kitchen. He goes to the living room to dump his things on a chair. The dog moves on to sniff Lio intently, his tail wagging lazily. 

“Hi, I don’t know you,” Lio says quietly. The dog just pants and keeps staring up at him. Lio pats the back of his head. 

“He’s old, he won’t hurt you,” Galo reminds him, walking back into the kitchen. He opens the door to the fridge, which is cluttered with magnets and old notes and things.

“It’s okay. He’s fine,” Lio says.

“Do you want anything to drink? I have uh… ginger ale,” he says. “And uh… just that. And water.”

“Oh uh, that’s fine. Ginger ale is fine,” he says. 

He sidesteps the dog, patting him as he does so. Galo hands Lio a can of soda from the box in the fridge. He finds of glass in the cabinet for himself and fills it with water from the sink.

“You can leave your stuff in the living room, or like, wherever. It doesn’t matter,” he says. “Uh, do you wanna see my room?” 

“Sure,” he says. He keeps his hands in the pockets of his motorcycle jacket, which is still zipped up to his face. 

He follows him out of the kitchen and through the living room. The dog trails after them at first, before electing to wander into his open crate and lie down. The room feels cozy to Lio, with a very comfortable looking grey couch. There’s a tv and a few different game consoles, and very little decor outside of a few fleece blankets and a few odd bits of trash. There isn’t a lot but it feels like a safe place to him. 

“Hang on, let me, like, clean…” Galo says quickly, as soon as he opens the door to his room. 

He puts his glass down on a windowsill and starts hastily picking things up off the floor. Lio waits for him patiently behind a half open door. He opens his can of soda. 

He unzips his jacket as well, though he still doesn’t take off his back pack. He takes a few sips of his ginger ale. He glances back at the dog, who is chewing loudly on one of his toys. Galo hurries back out of his room with a bundle of chip bags and receipt paper and plastic bottles. 

“Hang on. Not yet,” he says as he carries the trash into the kitchen. Lio hears him shove it all into the kitchen trash can, which he was pretty sure was already full. 

He hears a small clamor, followed by the snap of the screen door and then the slam of the outside door. He briefly hears a few cicadas humming in the pink evening light. 

He takes another sip of the soda. 

After a few moments the door opens back up and he hears the faucette in the kitchen roar for a few seconds. Then Galo comes trotting back toward him.

“Did you look?”

“No”

“Good.”

He moves on passed him back to his room. Lio stays where he is, but glances out of the corner of his eye and sees him tossing his clothes into a heap in a laundry basket.

Eventually, he’s satisfied enough to open the door and let him in.

“Okay, sorry,” he says, finally opening the door all the way. “You can put your bag down, it’s okay.”

Lio awkwardly lets the bag slip off his shoulders and drops it on the floor next to a big cloth folding chair. Then he wordlessly sinks into the chair with his soda. He takes another sip.

“Okay, so, uh, these are my gundams,” Galo says, pointing to the figures on the shelf above his bed. “Some of them aren’t gundams. Some of them are other things.” 

“They’re cute,” Lio says. His eyes feel so tired, and now that he’s sitting, he realizes his legs are really starting to ache. Of course, the ache had been in the background this whole time, but he’d been able to ignore it. It hadn’t seemed that bad. He suddenly wonders if he’ll be able to stand back up. 

He feels himself sink further into the chair as Galo kneels on his twin-sized bed, pointing to a few choice figures to explain in a little more depth. He does find it genuinely cute. He’s not sure he gets it, but he’s glad it makes him happy. 

“These are my fire fighting things, or guys, and a little mini matoi Lucia 3D printed for me,” he continues.

Lio isn’t sure how he should react. It seems like he’s just enjoying explaining his collection to him, but he’s worried he doesn’t seem interested enough. However, he’s also not giving him much room to interject, so he just lets him go on for as long as he wants to. 

He starts to become aware of how cold the drink is in his hand, though, and how it’s making his fingers feel sore and weak. He takes another sip and opts to set it up on top of the messy and overflowing dresser. 

He tucks his hands into the pockets of his jacket. He doesn’t realize it as it’s happening, but Galo’s expositions all start to run together into mud. His eyes start to drift close. He feels like he’s listening. He’s pretty sure he’s listening.

“Lio?”

He tries to get himself to blink his eyes open.

“Hey, Lio? Are you okay?”

God, his eyes are so attached to being closed. 

“Yeah, sorry,” he mumbles. “I think I’m tired from hiking.” He slips further in his seat and his collar comes up around his ears. 

“Oh, that’s okay,” Galo says. “Do you want to like, order a pizza and watch a movie? Also, do you have your speech thingy prepared?”

He groans into his motorcycle jacket. 

“Don’t ask me about that,” he says. “I have it written down. It’s okay.”

“Oh, okay. Do you have stuff to wear, or do we have to go back to your house tomorrow?” he asks. “Just so we’re prepared.”

“I have a suit,” he yawns. “But yeah, we’ll have to go back and get it. But the thing isn’t ‘til night, so…” 

“Okay,” he says. 

Lio stretches his legs. It does nothing to help the pain.

“Do you, like, feel okay?” Galo asks tentatively. 

“Mmhmm,” he nods, his eyes finally making the decision that they must be closed and the rest of him has no say in the matter.

How sweet of them.

When he wakes up- Well, first of all, he was asleep, apparently. But when he wakes up, the window that had been bright and orange sunny is now black, and the little lamp beside the bed provides the light. The lamp beside the bed. Ah, he is in a bed. The covers feel unfamiliar, but they smell like Galo’s shirts. 

He hears some music and sound from a video game, and sees the cool light of a tv reflecting on the wall beside him. Galo is sitting on the other end of the bed with the controller in his hands. 

Lio stretches his, still painful, maybe a little numb, legs out to nudge his thigh. 

Galo looks over at him briefly before continuing to play his game. 

“Did you have a good nap?” he asks. 

He mumbles a “Yeah.” in his direction and then sinks back into the covers. 

“Do you want anything to eat? I did get that pizza,” Galo asks. 

Lio sighs. 

“Maybe in a little while,” he says. 

He feels, of course, a little sick, but more than that, he feels warm. His heart feels like it’s gently floating. He watches Galo play his game and pulls the covers up to his chin. He can’t remember the last time he was just... in someone’s house.

He wonders if he’s ever just laid in someone else’s bed like this, in a place where he felt safe. He thinks maybe he has, but it would’ve been before he began to burn. It would’ve been in highschool, and not exactly like this. He doesn’t like to remember highschool. 

He tries to remember anyone else who’s ever just sat with him like this. He’s imagined it a few times, but not too many, knowing he’d never really have it. He remembers times before he’d taken over Mad Burnish that are too horrible to recall in full detail. He also remembers times after he became their leader where he had to be something strange in every relationship. 

Lio had gone from being unrelentingly assumed to be a victim and a pushover because of his appearance to being expected to perform as someone with complete control, sometimes asked to take too much control. He remembers more than one person being disappointed he wasn’t rougher with them. But he thinks he might be tired of being rough. 

There must have been something in the middle, though. He’s been in love before. 

He’s been in comfortable beds and beds that wreak of danger. 

But this is such a safe place. 

His chest feels so sunny.

He wants to kiss Galo again but he doesn't want to get up. He nudges him with his foot again.

“What time is it?” Lio asks him. 

He notices his jacket hanging on Galo’s desk chair with his backpack. He hopes his phone hasn’t died.

“Uh…” Galo says, reaching into his pocket for his phone. “It’s almost 10.”

“Mmm…”

That’s a bit later than he was hoping, but not too bad. He glances around Galo’s room. It’s pretty small and tightly packed with everything he loves. The walls are covered in posters and his closet is overflowing onto his desk. 

Galo is still playing his game. 

Lio pulls one leg out from under the covers. He lays his foot on Galo’s lap. 

“Oh, Hi,” Galo says.

“Hi,” he responds.

He continues on to nudge him in the stomach and annoy him as much as he can without getting up. 

“Do you need something?” Galo laughs.

Lio slides a little further down the mattress so that he can lay his whole leg on his lap. He stays as covered by the comforter as he can, though. It’s so nice and warm. 

Galo finally pauses the game. He puts the controller on the floor.

“Do you fucking need something?” he repeats. 

Galo moves across the bed, eventually coming to plant a hand firmly on either side of Lio’s chest. He leans over him, his blue hair falling forward in front of his face. 

“Sorry, are you busy?” Lio asks, blinking his eyes and raising his brow. His mouth is crooked and smirking.

“Yeah, I’m super busy,” Galo says, laying down further onto his elbows. His hair brushes against Lio’s forehead. 

“Oh, I’m sorry, if you’re busy,” Lio says, smiling. 

“So do you need something? Huh? Do you need help?” 

His breath is warm on Lio’s face as he presses his lips against his. 

“Is something the matter?” Galo smiles into his mouth. His voice is a deep and slow whisper. 

Lio kisses him back. There are sparks in his stomach again. His mouth is so smooth and soft as he presses his tongue past his teeth. He takes his time to just savor every breath. The moment is only brief before he pulls back a little and gives him a few quick pecks. 

Galo lays half on his chest and half beside him, caught tight against the wall. His thumbs find his cheeks and rub them idly. 

He kisses him quickly. 

“Did that help?”

He kisses him again.

Lio just smiles as his eyes close blissfully. He feels so warm and soft and so high above the clouds. 

Galo kisses him on the cheek just once before laying his head next to his. He relaxes more, draping an arm across his chest and over his shoulder, his hand in his soft pale hair. His breath is so sweet and gentle on his neck. 

“Yes,” Lio finally says, feeling quite pink. 

He brings his fingers up to idly stroke Galo’s arm. 

He wonders when the last time he had this was. 

Galo’s lips just graze his jaw.

He wonders if he ever has.

Lio wonders how long he can have this. He wonders how long he’s allowed to be calm. He wonders when the universe will take this away from him. He wonders how he ever went without this. He wonders why he feels like crying.

“You’re so lovely…” is all he can muster to say to him. 

Galo responds by taking his shoulder in his hand and pulling him close to his chest. The warmth of it all finally makes him well up again. He rolls over to hide his face in his t-shirt. He closes his eyes tightly. 

Lio’s fingers softly stroke the fabric stretched tightly against his ribs. His foot caresses his calf. He feels his hand, large and comforting, on his back.

He wants to tell him never to leave him, but he knows that's an impossible request.

They lay in silence, Galo’s hand moving slowly over his shoulders and down his spine. Lio just enjoys the slow rise and fall of his much broader chest. He feels himself beginning to fall back to sleep. 

He drifts a little. He feels fingers brush over his cheek, pushing his hair away from his eyes.

Then he feels Galo’s thumb on his cheek again. However, the softness is interrupted by him abruptly deciding to pinch and tug at Lio’s lip hair. 

“You have a little rat stache,” Galo says. “It’s hard to see because your hair is so light but you have a little rat stache.” 

“Stop…” he whispers half heartedly. 

“Congratulations on your little rat stache.” 

“Shut up!” He smiles. 

He turns his face to bury it deeper into his chest. He suddenly feels hungry. Like, abruptly, ravenously hungry. As though his body finally realized it hadn’t let him eat more than a turkey sandwich today. Apparently the time to eat was right now and he may not get another chance. 

“Where’s that pizza?” 

“It’s in the kitchen.” 

It takes a few minutes for both of them to will themselves to leave the bed. However, Lio isn’t sure how long this brief lapse in feeling like utter shit will last. With great reluctance, he pulls himself from Galo’s arms, and, even worse, removes the blanket. And even worse than that, he gets off the bed and stands up. 

He ignores the way prickling vibrations of numbness and pain shoot up from the bottoms of his feet, all the way up to the middle of his thighs. He also stumbles toward the door through his vision going momentarily white as all the blood rushes out of his head. He leans on the door frame so that he doesn’t fall over. 

Galo follows after him and pats him on the shoulder briefly.

“You okay?” he asks him as he opens the door.

Lio doesn’t answer and follows him back through the dark living room. Varys is sitting on the couch and watching a movie with his dog in his lap. They walk past them quickly into the narrow little kitchen. Galo flicks on the light. 

He opens the pizza box that is (barely) sitting on the cluttered counter, as well as the little box of garlic knots. He eats a couple himself. Lio takes a slice of the pizza and bites into it. It’s far greasier and saltier than the usual pizza place Galo orders from. 

He finds himself practically inhaling the slice, with it having finally, thankfully, caught up with him that he hasn’t properly eaten in a few days. The slice is gone quickly and he picks up another one.

“Do you want me to pay for half of this?” he asks.

“Oh, no it’s fine,” Galo says, opening the fridge to grab a can of soda.

“Are you sure? I have money now,” he tells him. 

“...From where?” Galo asks, cracking the can open. He kicks the fridge door closed.

“I uh….” he takes another bite of pizza. “I found more.” 

He shoves as much of the slice into his mouth as he can, suddenly regretting mentioning it. 

“Found more where?”

He can’t talk. His mouth is full of pizza. He starts to shove the crust into his mouth as well. Oh no, he can’t talk. All this pizza in his mouth… He has to chew all this pizza. He is too busy.

Galo leans on the counter next to him and sips his drink, waiting far too patiently. 

Neither of them let up in their pursuits.

Eventually, Lio swallows enough of the pizza to speak.

“I run a gang,” he says bluntly.

“How did you get the money, though?” Galo asks.

“It belongs to all of Mad Burnish,” he tells him, quickly grabbing a third slice of pizza. “I don’t know when or how it was acquired. I only took over the Mad Burnish two years ago.” 

Galo grimaces a little. Lio bites into the pizza as quickly as possible, disregarding any possible danger in eating this much this quickly. 

Varys momentarily comes into the kitchen to get a beer out of the fridge. 

“Ignis is working hard to get you pardoned. Don’t do anything to ruin it,” he warns. 

Lio turns around to look at him. He stands tall in the doorway and opens the can, glaring down at him.

“Yes, I was eavesdropping, sorry,” is all he says to Lio. “Galo, don’t let this little kid pull any shit.” 

Then he wanders back to his place in the living room and sits back on the couch. Lio watches a few seconds of his movie before turning back to Galo. 

“I’ve never done anything too horrible for money,” he tells him. “I took over the Mad Burnish so that I could gather resources and protection for the colony I wanted to set up. I didn’t let them kill anyone or do any bullshit after that.” 

He takes another bite of pizza. 

“Okay, I’m just not gonna think about it,” Galo finally says. “Or your cult.”

“It wasn’t a cult,” Lio says. “I got fired from my job for being Burnish for the 5th time in a row and they called Freeze Force on me so I ran away to be pissed in the desert for a week and figured I could either reform the Mad Burnish and set up a colony or die.”

Galo eats another garlic knot.

Lio shoves more pizza into his mouth. 

“I’m looking forward to being less desperate in the future,” he tells him. “Plus, the Mad Burnish are done with, so you don’t have to worry about it anymore.”

“Oh…”

“Meis and Gueira are going to leave, and then I can live in an apartment with two roommates I don’t like to my heart’s content,” he says. “And I didn’t kill Kray and there’s no more Promare for me to set things on fire with.”

“I’m sorry.” Galo’s brow comes together. “All I meant is that you’re literally getting pardoned tomorrow evening and I don’t want to see that get taken away from you,” he says. 

Lio finishes his current slice and doesn’t think for long enough about it before picking up a fourth.

“Also I’m sorry I didn’t let you kill Kray, but, like, I don’t want you to go to jail,” Galo says. 

He chews on this slice more slowly. 

Galo looks confused, and maybe a little angry, and hurt. Lio tries to make his own expression a little more lighthearted. He laughs awkwardly. 

“Look, I’m sorry,” he sighs. “I’m not doing anything illegal. I have no knowledge of where the money came from so if it came from somewhere illegal, it’s not my fault.” 

“I’m not sure that’s how that works.”

“Don’t worry about it. Most of it is for Gueira and Meis anyway.”

His stomach is starting to feel heavy but he keeps eating regardless. He at least isn’t nauseous. 

Galo’s hand falls softly on his head and roughs up his hair. 

“Just, stay safe, okay?” he says. 

Lio smiles a little bit. He supposes it’s good that he cares. He isn’t used to being on the other side of this kind of thing. 

“Okay. I’ve probably lectured Gueira and Meis enough on the same thing to deserve being on the receiving end of this kind of treatment,” he says. “I forcefully reformed a murderous biker gang into submission for my own goals. I can’t really say much.”

Galo’s face is still grimacing.

“Half of the things you say to me are completely terrifying,” he tells him. 

Lio laughs and forces himself to finish his fourth slice of pizza. He contemplates more, but remembers he hasn’t eaten anywhere near this much in a while and it might not be very smart. He’s already starting to feel tired again as well. 

“Do you want to go lie back down?”

“I’m actually still gross from hiking and I think I’m gonna shower,” Galo says. “If that’s okay.” 

“Oh, that’s fine.”

“You can shower too, if you want. Not, together! Just,” he stumbles through his words. “Unless, you- You can just shower- It’s fine.”

Lio covers his mouth in a gentle fist and laughs.

They don’t end up showering together, but he hopes they can another time. While he’s showering, though, Lio does take note of the fact that Galo uses that 3 in 1 shampoo conditioner and body wash and starts thinking of plans on how to intervene. 

Once he is warm and clean, he returns to Galo’s room in a towel he’d let him borrow. He closes the door behind him and pulls his backpack off of Galo’s desk chair. Galo is lying in his bed with damp hair. The TV is on. He does glance at him, though, before gluing his eyes more firmly to the screen. 

Lio digs through his bag for his underwear. When he finds them, along with a t-shirt, he lets his towel fall on the floor. He faces away from Galo as he steps into his boxers. He slips them on up over his legs and hips. Then he pulls the shirt over his head. It hangs loose and oversized on his shoulders.

Then he walks over to where Galo is laying. He brings his knee up to lean on the mattress and puts both of his hands firmly on his face. With only a moment to take in the pinkness in his cheeks, he lays a kiss down on his lips.

He hopes he never has to give up kissing him because he’s sure the withdrawal would kill him. 

He holds him in his mouth and plants his hands on either side of his head. For the moment, this is all he wants to do for the rest of his life. His heart absolutely aches for every ounce of him in the warm lamplight.

He takes a deep breath through his nose and slowly brings his leg over to the other side of his hips. He leans down on his elbows and knees and kisses him deeper and deeper until Galo cracks a little sound in the back of his throat. 

His larger hands find their way onto the back of his neck and shoulders. God, his fingers feel so sweet. 

Lio relaxes down onto his broader chest, letting his hips lay over his stomach. Galo kisses him back and brings his hands down to the sides of his ribs. Lio sighs a little at his touch. He pauses to take his lower lip in his teeth and pulls just a little. Galo lets out another tiny sound.

He brings his hands up behind his head until his thumbs overlap and kisses him roughly on the cheek. He holds his face close to his, smiling and littering him with lazy grazes of his lips. He drags kisses all the way up to his temple, and then down to his jaw, and then his neck. Galo leans his head to the side to allow him more room and sighs.

He feels his hands trail down to his hips and over his ass to his thighs. He grips him tightly for a moment. 

Lio’s tongue passes over his lips for a moment as he takes a breath in. 

“What time is it?” he asks.

“It’s a little after 1 last I checked.”

“Okay.”

He kisses him again, with his teeth and tongue, and pushes his hips a little more meaningfully against him. He squeezes his sides with his thighs.

Every breath in he takes feels flighty like sparkling wine. It doesn’t take long before all of him feels like a bundle of nervous, excited twitches. He takes all of Galo into him, absolutely all of him, every breath, every kiss, every tiny little gasp. And to return the favor, he absolutely lays himself back into him until a whine escapes his throat.

He pulls away to sit up for a moment, just a moment. He pushes Galo’s shirt up to his collar bone, and then brings himself back down to spread kisses across his chest. He quickly finds one of his nipples with his mouth and presses delicately with his tongue. He feels Galo’s chest shudder with his next breath. 

He makes sure his fingers and thumb find the other side of his chest, rubbing over the soft curve of his muscles and breast. All his ribs are twitching under him. He kisses and sucks and rubs him softly and absolutely loves him to death. 

“How much do you want to do?” Galo asks him, his voice shaking slightly. 

Lio pauses to think for a second and just idly kisses on his tit. 

“I would love to get you off,” he says, barely thinking. “I just think you deserve it.”

Galo breathes. 

“And I don’t think I want to do too much,” he continues. “I’m tired and I ate too much pizza, but I want to get you off.”

There’s another pause. He gently rubs his fingers over his areola and lays his head on his chest.

“Is that okay?” Galo asks.

Lio looks up at him without lifting his head.

“I wouldn’t offer if it wasn’t,” he says. “I uh, have something. That I brought. If you’d be into that.” 

Galo’s hand strokes his arm. His face is red and he can hear his heart beating in his chest.

“Uh, sure. That’d be cool,” he says, his voice whispy.

“Okay,” he says, hands circling his chest. “It’s not a strap or anything, it’s just a regular vibe. I figure we can save that for another time, but I’m...”

He sits up a little and rubs his mouth in thought. He looks up at the tightly drawn blinds.

“I feel a little weird about being on the receiving end, sometimes,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

There’s a pause. He swallows.

“I like doing things for other people,” he continues. “And you did a lot for me already today.”

Lio sits up further and pats him on the side of his dumbfounded face. He gives him a smile. 

“Doesn’t mean I won’t ever let you top,” he says cheerfully. “You can even tell me what you want me to do if you want.”

He gets up and leaves him on the bed. He goes back to dig through his bag for the vibe, a condom, and the tiny tube of lubricant. It’s just a small and simple battery operated toy, but it’s never failed him. 

Then he quickly returns to him to settle back down on his chest. He sets the lube on the bed. He looks at every curve of his cheek bones, the quiet relaxation in his eyes and the gentle puffiness of his well-kissed lips. He feels like he takes too much from him as it is. His fingers stroke over the burn marks on his arm. 

He’s sure he has his own trouble. He wishes he’d open up to him a little more. Lio feels like he’s just punctured and pouring out all over him constantly and he hasn’t done anywhere near enough to deserve it. 

He lays down on top of him again and gives him a few more kisses. His hands thread behind his head again, the vibrator between his fingers. He pushes against him a little with his hips.

“So what do you want me to do?” he whispers, pressing his forehead against his. 

His lips trail over his teasingly and Galo’s hands quickly find his ass. Oh, there’s next to nothing he’d rather be doing right now. His lips are just so soft. He pushes with his tongue and Galo kisses him back with enthusiasm.

“Whatever you want,” he whispers back. 

Lio smiles and kisses him once. He rolls his hips against him again.

“Okay,” he says. “That’s a very trusting answer.”

He presses his lips into the corner of his mouth and kisses him hard. Then he starts mouthing down his face toward his jaw. He kisses into the soft and slightly-stubbly skin of his neck. Oh, what an answer it is. He kisses with his teeth. 

And then he sucks.

Galo moans quietly and it floods all of his nerves. He feels his hands squeeze his thighs harder, feels his fingers nearly reach his crotch. He kisses down to his collarbone. He moves soft and slow and deliberate over him, every single touch a perfect beat in the rhythm. God, he wants his mouth on every part of him, on all his nice warm skin. He wants to touch every single nerve. 

As Lio makes his way back down to his chest, Galo’s hands trail up his ribs. Lio takes a few gasps of his own as he brings his mouth all over him again. He can’t help but drag his tongue softly over his nipple again. He absolutely loves the shape of his chest. He loves every inch of him. He just wants to make him feel good.

He’s slowly, softly, and sweetly on his chest, sliding down to his shaking ribs. Galo’s hands hold him gently, pulling up his shirt and dragging it so easily up his slender back. Lio feels so lithe and loving as his lips stroke over his quivering muscles. 

He works his hips deliberately and rhythmically against his, pushing against his sweatpants. 

Galo slips his shirt up to his head, and he pauses only to let him drag it off of him. It gets tossed off the bed.

Lio sits up to tear open the condom with his teeth. He slips it neatly over the vibrator, which he holds loosely in his fingers. He swings a leg over to the other side of him, so that he is pressed between Galo and the wall, laying on his hip and leaning on a hand. The lube winds up stuck between the two of them.

He drags his fingers over his stomach and watches all his lovely muscles twitch. 

“I can’t get over how pretty you are,” Lio mumbles softly. “And hot. And real.” 

He presses a palm over his belly and drags his touch down to his hips. He lays down next to him, safely against the cool wall and his warm body. His much larger arm drapes around him. Lio’s fingers slip under his waistband. Galo breathes in.

There’s a spark of adrenaline in him again. He’s still holding the vibrator in his other hand.

His hand sinks deeper and he presses against the soft warmth of his flesh. He’s already pretty wet. Galo moans lazily at his initial touch, his eyes half closed. 

Lio strokes him slowly, pushing through his slick and dripping folds. 

“Is this good?” he asks. 

“Yeah, keep doing that,” he tells him.

He lays his head against his chest and lets his own eyes drift nearly shut. He drags his fingers through him back and forth until he finds a good rhythm. He loves and loves and loves him.

Little shaking gasps slip out of Galo’s throat every time his fingers come up to press over his clit. He feels rigid under his touch, and he presses firmly, rocking back and forth. Galo’s hips roll in little twitches with every unward stroke.

All his gasps are so sugar hot and quiet.

Lio kisses his chest a bit. 

He presses deeper and deeper into him. He figures he’s about as wet as he’s going to get. He gives him a few more good strokes before slipping his hand back out of his boxers. He opts for the lube, tucked neatly between them and hopefully warmer now. 

He uncaps the tube and slicks the toy in his hand before twisting it onto a medium setting. 

He kisses him on the collar bone as he slips it under his waistband. 

Lio pushes it firmly against him, and Galo immediately lets out a hitching gasp. Lio smiles, eyes closing, and rests his head against his chest, and starts to pick up his rhythm again. 

“Is this good?” he asks, inferring the answer. 

“Mmhmm,” he says gruffly. 

He strokes and strokes and his hips roll with him. He finds his own hips, too, are pushing tightly against him. He feels wet too, but he’s determined to pull every sound out of his throat that he can, regardless. He could easily fall asleep to his sighs.

He starts to press into him a bit, still making sure to push just right against his clit. He feels his hand grip his back even tighter, crushing him into his chest. 

He finds himself sliding the toy with such an easy rhythm that he barely has to think about it. The vibrations travel up his fingers and his eyes close and all he does is listen to Galo breathe and shudder. He starts to drift, just feeling and breathing and loving him.

He idly presses his mouth over his nipple again just as Galo squeezes a creaking moan out of his throat. 

He feels like he probably isn’t doing enough at the moment, like he could be giving him more, but he’s glad he’s enjoying it. He’s glad his legs are laying out wide and twitching for him. 

He turns his face into his chest and just listens to him. His moans get deeper in his throat and, more than once, he tries to sit up and kiss him on the temple. Lio pushes more and more and more, until his arm starts to hurt, with Galo pushing back to compliment his every movement.

“God,” he breathes. “Lio…”

His fingers are deep in his damp hair when he lets out a long and low sound. He clutches tightly at his back, squeezing him into his side. Oh, he sounds so searing hot. 

He hears him huff a few more breaths, rolling his hips to the side.

He keeps giving him small, low, and throaty groans. Galo’s other arm is suddenly wrapping tightly around him and he’s rolling over onto his side. Lio is quickly crushed into a hug and Galo's face is roughly pushing into his hair.

“Mmm… God…” Galo mumbles, trapping the toy between his legs.

Galo finds Lio’s mouth and takes it just in time to shatter. He kisses him through a deep groan that blends into an open-mouthed sigh into his ear. He holds him tightly and Lio tries to clamour an arm around to hold him too. He pulls the toy away and holds it awkwardly, now pinned firmly in his grip. 

He laughs. 

“I’m glad you liked it,” he says, kissing him on the cheek.

He just buries his face in his shoulder and mumbles, lips just barely kissing at his skin. Lio gives him plenty of time to breathe, entirely content to do this as many times as he wants. 

He’s just happy to not have to think about tomorrow, and to be able to love him here and now. 

Reaches over him for a moment to set the toy on his nightstand. With his hands free he can more properly hold him.  
He gives his crotch a few extra little squeezes through his pajama pants before wrapping both of his arms around him. 

“You’re so hot,” he tells Galo. “You’re so hot and beautiful. God…”

Galo just pants into his neck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This got a little too long oops. I feel like I personally have very little energy lately and I struggle with writing Galo bc he is so intense so I'm sorry if he feels like.... nerf'd. let me know what u think I really love reading ur comments it always makes my day :3
> 
> I also feel like I'm having issues w pacing and the characters come to quickly whenever i write smut but like, there are only so many words out there. i only know like four words
> 
> anyway theres a much much longer chapter ahead of this one that isnt horny at all so get ready for uhhhhhhh
> 
> I am so disorganized rn isolation has me so dead dude i just want lio to get kissed and be happy ):


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so this was originally going to go before they went hiking but I like, lost interest in it and didn't finish it until now. So here it is, a little out of order. Then I have another chapter that is already finished that I'll probably post in a day or so.

**BEFORE, AT THE BEGINNING OF THIS WEEK**

Galo leans on his hand, unable to stop himself from smiling. His body feels just a little bit flighty. He hasn’t even had more than a test-sip of his coffee yet. It’s still far too hot. He takes another bite of his pastry. 

Aina sighs, looking tired. 

“I’m glad you’re at least enjoying yourself this weekend. I can’t wind down. I just keep thinking about work,” she says. 

“Well, you’ve got the rest of today to try to relax,” Galo says, smiling softly. “Work will still come tomorrow, no matter what you do today.” 

His leg is jittering.

“I take it your date went well?” she asks, slumping further onto the table. 

Galo wonders if he should take Lio here to get coffee. He’s been here before, but the decor is all new. They didn't have this outside seating before. He wonders if Lio likes coffee. Everyone likes coffee. Of course he likes coffee.

“Yeah, we had a nice time,” he says. He tries to take another sip of his coffee. It burns his tongue. Still too hot.

“Did you do anything fun?” she asks. She just picks at her scone wrapped in parchment paper.

Galo hums.

“Yeah. We smoked and made out and stuff,” he says, thoughtfully. 

“That’s good,” Aina says. 

“Do you remember when I arrested him?” he says. 

“Yes.”

“We’ve come so far.”

“I’m very happy for you.”

Galo carefully squeezes the lid off of his coffee cup. He doesn’t realize how much he’s smiling. Aina watches him with tired eyes

“So is he like….” she starts. “He’s okay, right? I mean, I guess… You seem to like him, and everything. And I know you guys, you know, went through a lot together, but he’s like… He’s at least nice, right?”

Galo picks up his pastry again. It’s sweet and flaky, strawberry and cheesecake, drizzled with sugar glaze. He chews, trying to figure out what she means by that.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, he’s pretty nice. You’ve worked with him.”

Aina hesitates. She grimaces a little.

“Yeah, but, he still used to be an arsonist,” she says. “I know he's like, passionate, but you…”

Galo’s brow comes together. He eats a little more of his pastry.

Aina shrugs and stretches her face into all sorts of expressions. 

Galo frowns.

“Galo, you’re like…” she starts, and then stops. She picks at her scone. “Galo, I know you’re a really tough world hero and everything, but if anything goes wrong, you can talk to me, okay?”

Galo rolls his eyes and leans back in his chair. He swallows.

“Aina, he’s just a guy,” he says. “Like, he just acts like a regular guy. He isn’t like… I don’t know. He’s fine.”

“Okay,” Aina says. “But if anything isn’t fine, at some point, don’t feel weird about telling me.”

Galo picks up his coffee again and takes another tentative sip. It burns a little, but it’s a bit cooler now. It’s not scalding, at least. He can taste it this time, at least.

“If Lio turns out to be a sociopath, I’ll let you in on all the details,” he tells her. 

Aina leans on her hand. She takes a sip of her own coffee.

“Okay,” she says. “How have you been doing otherwise? Are you sleeping better?” 

Galo stares into his cup and drums his fingers on the table. A single car drives down the strangely barren street beside them. Not many people still have cars.

“Yeah, I’m going to bed a little earlier,” he says. He might be lying. “Are you doing alright?”

She shrugs and she sighs. No one on earth is having a good time right now, they both know. 

“Is your sister alright?” Galo asks.

She chews her lip for a moment. She shrugs again. Galo taps the side of his cup with his finger.

“Have you talked to her?”

Again, she shrugs.

Galo takes a deep breath into his chest and lets it out his nose. It ripples through the surface of his coffee. He takes another sip.

“We’ll be okay,” Galo says, assuredly. “We’ve worked hard, and things will be okay.”

He gives her a smile. She tries to give him one back. Then his eyes fall away and his smile fades. He hopes he can go home and sleep after this. Coffee usually puts him to sleep anyway.

It’s difficult for him to admit, but all he really wants to do with the rest of his day off is climb into his bed and never get out of it. He had planned to maybe do some laundry or the dishes after this, but he already knows that isn’t happening.

The only thing he’s going to do is walk into his apartment, go right to his room, fall on his bed, and sleep with his jeans on. And, of course, hope he doesn’t have too many nightmares about screaming Burnish and dying loved ones and pink flames. 

Galo isn’t very talented at dealing with his own anguish.  
\----

The truck slows to a crawl as the driver pulls in under a high and creaking ceiling. The warehouse is empty and crumbling, even more so than how they’d left it. Meis thanks the driver, and pays him, and tips him before opening the door to let his boots drop onto the withered concrete. His footsteps echo through the wide room as he climbs up to get the back door.

Lio steps down onto the edge of the truck, and then quickly onto the ground with Meis’ hand steady in his. Gueira is close behind him. 

Lio breathes in the familiar dry desert air. It feels so good to be in the shade of this old place again and stare out at the endless rolling dunes. He can still see the shadows of Promepolis in the distance, but it’s nice to be away from the city. He misses being out here with Mad Burnish. He misses Gueira and Meis standing behind him like this. He doesn’t want this to end.

Their footsteps scrape and clack across the dusty floor as they leave the protection of the truck. The driver starts to pull away. The wind whips the desert sand into curling streamers outside. 

A second truck is already waiting on the other side of the warehouse, with a flat trailer covered by a tarp. The driver approaches as the trio does until they meet his broad form in the center of the floor.

“Thank you for doing this for us,” Lio says softly. 

The man smiles down at them. He’s much larger than all three of them, but they’ve done business together before.

“My daughter told me you pulled her out of those pods yourself,” he says, arms crossed and smile beaming. “It’s the least I could do for you guys.”

Lio’s smile is small and modest.

“I was glad to hear she’s still doing okay,” he says, reaching into the inside of his jacket. “I hope you and your family aren’t being afflicted too terribly.” 

He offers up his pay in the form of a wad of cash in his gloved hand.

“Oh, no, Fotia, this is a favor for you and the Mad Burnish for everything you’ve done,” the man insists. “There’s no reason for you to pay me.”

Lio doesn’t retract his offer, still holding out the cash for him.

“Then this is a favor too,” he says. “The government isn’t going to help any of us for long. We have to help each other. You’re undercharging me as it is. Take it.” 

The tarp is untied and torn from the truck bed, revealing the three motorcycles he’d promised him. His eyes go straight to the shiny black cruiser he’d asked for for himself. He hopes the other two are to Gueira and Meis’s liking. Two other men undo the bungee cables holding them onto the truck bed. 

The man hesitates for one more moment.

“Please.”

He finally reaches out to take the cash with his much larger hand. He fingers through it for a moment before shoving it into his pocket.

The bikes are pulled out onto the floor for them to appreciate in all their glory. It feels like it could be a beautiful new beginning, but he knows this is more like a final goodbye. The man offers him the shiny silver keys and they catch the afternoon sun.

Lio takes them.

“You’re very generous, Fotia. Thank you for everything.” the man says. 

“Of course.”

“The tabs on the keys match their bike color. Red one for the red bike, blue for blue and black for black.” 

“Thank you.” 

As soon as Lio hands the keys for the red bike to Gueira, he’s bolting over to have a look at it. He knows it isn’t an ATV like he likes, but Lio is glad he still appreciates it. Both of them are excited, and if Lio were more inclined to show it, he’d be there with them. 

Because, fuck, that bike is everything he’s ever wanted. 

—-

Lio Fotia vastly underestimated how much he really, really just needed to just do 90 on a motorcycle down any empty desert road. He’d anticipated that it would help, but he didn’t fully appreciate how dead he really felt most days until now. 

The fact that he had to wear a helmet now was the only thing really dragging the moment down even slightly. He wanted to take it off, feel completely untethered from reality. 

He didn’t even want to get to their destination. He just wanted to go faster, indefinitely until the engine combusted and he burned alive. He just wanted to burn alive again. He just wanted to feel larger and faster and stronger than himself. 

He wanted to crash this thing into the sandstone and laugh it off. He wanted to ride it off the side of a building into a freeze force truck. He wanted to be on fire. He wanted to kill Kray Foresite. He wanted to drive straight into a wall. 

But he had to at least be on the lookout for the right landmarks, so he couldn’t dip too far into that fantasy. 

As they drove, absolutely roaring down this empty highway, he saw just the boulder he was looking for in the distance. And then he remembered how mortal he was. And he realized how intensely close he was to just absolutely killing himself over something as stupid as adrenaline. 

What the fuck was he? An idiot? Maybe. A recently divorced father? Perhaps in a sense, but not to this degree. Something about his desperation to feel less pathetic made him feel more so. 

He started to slow down, prompting Gueria and Meis to follow his lead. 

And then, as an intersection came up on the road, he bared to the right toward the rising cliffs. 

And further down that road, they’d turn right again, but this time out into the cracked and barren desert. 

A few miles out is the last possible place there would be anything left of the Mad Burnish’s assets. They park the bikes in the shade of the sandstone, neat what may have been a house thirty years ago. However, all that was left of it was grey petrified wood, a crumbling fireplace, and the door to the basement stairs. 

The three of them dig through the sand, at first lazily with their boots and then with their hands. Soon, they’re scraping at a wooden cellar door. Eventually, they uncover the padlock holding it shut. 

Lio pulls a ring of keys from the pocket of his jacket. He’s never actually seen what’s inside this one. He’s not sure which key even unlocks it, having inherited all these locks from the previous leader of the Mad Burnish, who he had not met.

“God, I hope anyone even put anything here to begin with,” Gueira mumbles. 

“Well, it’s locked so that’s a good sign,” Lio says, trying perhaps his third or fourth key. Has he already tried this one? Oh well. 

He sighs and groans as he crouches over the sandy hatch in the burning sunlight. Meis and Gueira both sit down after it’s clear this is going to take a minute. 

“What if we don’t have the key for it?” Gueira whispers. 

“We have the key for it,” Meis whispers back. 

After about 8 out of 9 keys don’t work, Lio just hopes there’s another way in so they can at least get out of the sun. He’s never in his life been bothered by the heat. His face and chest and back feel strangely wet. He feels like he should know what that is. He’s felt it before. What is it? Oh right. Sweat. 

He puts the 9th key into the lock and holds his breath. 

Thankfully, the key turns. And the lock releases. And he’s able to pull it off and undo the latch. 

When they drag the door open, a rush of cool air hits their faces. The descent down the basement stairs is refreshing. Another feeling Lio never thought he’d experience. He tries to ignore how much his legs hurt going down the stairs. 

The basement walls and floors have a coating of sand, having apparently not been adequately protected from the elements. It mostly just looks like a regular basement, with dusty power tools and an old laundry unit. The walls are concrete and rough. The ceiling is made of corkboard. Their footsteps scrape against the gritty floor.

Lio leans against one of the support pillars, trying to take some strain off of his legs. Maybe the bikes weren’t a great idea. Maybe he was just old and going through a midlife crisis in his mid twenties.

Meis and Gueira find the safe built into the brick wall in the back of the room. 

Lio watches from against the pillar. 

He is confident there’s at least something in there. Whether or not it is enough to cover the cost of the bikes and have enough left over to be useful, though, is another story. He slips a hand into his pocket and slumps a little further. 

After a few tries with putting in the combination, the lock clicks. Gueira drags the heave safe door open.

It creaks loudly, echoing through the quiet of the basement.

All three of them breathe a sigh of relief.

The safe is not completely full, but there’s something. Quite a few different somethings, in fact. They wind up taking back a not-insignificant amount of cash, as well as a few other odds and ends.

Lio walks slowly up the basement stairs, trailing behind the other two, examining a sword that had been amongst the mix. It was dirty, and not very sharp, but he could fix that if he felt like it. The hilt was gold, or more likely brass, and sculpted into the shape of a dragon winding itself into a coil, with its gaping jaw forming the wristguard. 

He knows how to use a sword, at least. Even if he’s used to a sword made of fire. Although, it might be out of place and a little unnecessary in the new world they’ve found themselves in. It still feels nice to hold, anyway. 

It will look nice in his ugly house, anyway.

They put what cash and other items they can into the saddle bags of their bikes. They’ll count it when they get home. 

\------

Galo awakens abruptly at the dizzying hour of 1 am, after sleeping for who knows how long. His mouth feels sticky and dry and his vision swims as he sits up in his bed. He feels foggy and not at all awake enough, but also certainly unable to fall back to sleep.

Visions still flicker from his dreams between every blink. There’s a distorted voice that is an amalgam of all kinds of anguished screaming, and so many spinning stars. There’s blazing hot light and stretching hands, stretching up, stretching toward him, stretching themselves. They stretch their fingers longer and longer, and stretch their wrists right out of their bones.

All their skin is burning.

He doesn’t know what a lot of it even is. Some of it seems benign when he’s awake, but absolutely ungodly in his sleeping state. 

He tries to blink back a horrible image of Lio, slack jawed and burning, dissolving, melting, screaming, his jaw stretching like putty.

He’s always had some pretty vivid dreams. The house fire really kicked them off early. He had all but grown out of some of them, though. He’d been getting so much better. He’d been so much better than when he was a teenager. 

Now, he was just shaking and sweating, alone. 

Galo runs a hand over his face.

He gets up to walk to the kitchen. The walk is a little bit of a rush as his heart is still pounding in his chest and his eyes don’t seem to want to focus just yet. He hopes if he just eats something, he’ll feel better. He hopes it’ll ground him.

He opens the fridge in the dark kitchen and lets the light sear his eyes. He squints into the mostly empty shelves. Something smells a little weird again. He’s not sure what has gone bad this time. He hopes it’s Varys’s fault this time.

Galo pulls the paper bag with last night’s take out still left in it and pulls out the remaining fried rice. Then, using the light from the fridge to illuminate the wall, finds the light switch above the counter.

He squints his eyes a little harder.

Then he finds a fork in the dish drainer and leans against the counter. He shovels cold pork fried rice into his mouth, barely tasting it, still disoriented. 

He hopes things go back to normal soon.

He hopes he can go back to bed somehow. But he’ll probably be up until dawn.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> spontaneously decides to add more plot to this and accidentally makes it really long

The hall is wide and the floors are shiny marble. The windows are high and stretch up toward the ceiling, which appears to still be in the process of being painted into a blue heavenly scene with flying cherubs. There’s still some scaffolding set up in a corner that hasn’t been removed. 

The intent of the banquet is supposed to be some kind of “apology” or “union” between the government of Promepolis and the Burnish. A little “Oh, we’re sorry we’ve been doing horrible crimes against humanity to you. We didn’t think you’d set our big spaceship fueled by human suffering on fire and then save our asses from certain death,” dinner date. 

It is no surprise to a single person in attendance that the hall is divided worse than a high school cafeteria, with a mixture of aristocracy and politicians in white suits on one side and a mess of former gang members in black suits on the other. The two groups glare at each other like chess pieces before the game can start. One might even mistake it for a very bitter wedding. 

Lio’s gaze hasn’t broken from Kray Foresight’s in what feels like hours, though it may have only been about twenty minutes. His feet are up on the table, and his hand is firmly on his sword, and Gueira and Meis are close on either side. Any other Mad Burnish members they could rummage up from the rubble are clustered up behind him, all their stares fixated on their target.

Kray is no different, except for in the way he sits. He is dignified, and calm, pretending to be the picture of civility that the city of Promepolis once knew him to be. His suit is pristine and his hands are folded. His constituents are calm and a few of them are chatting. Lio watches them over the tops of his dress boots. Then there’s the matter of Colonel Vulcan, who is absolutely sneering back at him. 

The wait staff for the event is making their rounds. They’re all very nervous, smiling as best as they can, but they can feel the tension too. Lio doesn’t fail to notice that they’re extra nervous around the Burnish. When they make their way to the Burnish’s side of the event hall, they start in the middle with Lio’s table, most likely having been instructed to do so.

The waitress smiles wide with a scrunched brow. 

“Hello, how are you doing this evening? Would you like the salad, steak, or pasta dishes? The pasta and salad both come with the option of grilled chicken. Did you get a copy of the drink menu?”

Lio gestures for Meis to start, because he is on the left side of the table. 

“The steak is fine, thank you.” 

“I would like the pasta with chicken, thank you.”

“I’d also like the steak, thanks.”

She scribbles it down quickly. 

“Can I get you anything to drink?” 

Meis orders a beer.

Lio briefly glances back down at the cocktail menu and all of their horrific event-specific names. He leans forward and pushes the menu toward the waitress to point to the drink he wants so that he doesn’t have to say it out loud.

“Okay, I will also need an ID from you,” she says.

Lio grimmaces a little, and briefly breaks eye contact with the waitress to glance at Colonel Vulcan. His sharp and wild teeth seem to be grinning wider and wider at him every time he checks.

“Come on, do you have any idea who you’re talking to-”

In a snap, Lio’s hand shoots up to cover Gueira’s shrill mouth.

“Burnish are polite to wait staff,” he tells him softly. When he’s sure he’s swallowed his words, he drags his fingers off of his jaw and starts to dig for his wallet.

Gueira orders a rum and coke.

Lio finds his wallet and slips out his ID card for the waitress. She takes it and glances at it briefly before handing it back to him.

“Thank you,” she says. “There’s an open bar courtesy of the Foresight Foundation and your meal should be out shortly.” 

“Thank you,” Lio says. 

As she walks away, he lays his feet back up on the table. His expression stretches into something between a smile and a cringe. The Foresight Foundation…

“Oh, so Kray is paying for our drinks then,” Meis says, leaning on his arm.

“Don’t get any ideas. We have to make a good impression,” Lio tells him. 

“Aw, but when are we going to get another opportunity like this?” Gueira sighs, folding his arms and laying on the table. His eyes are clearly still on Kray, however. 

Lio sheaths and unsheaths his sword with his thumb. 

“They’ll expect us to act unruly,” he says. “Just like we can’t throw the first punch, we can only drink as much as they do.”

“So if these politicians start going apeshit, then can I take full advantage of the open bar?” Gueira asks.

Lio smiles, eyes narrowed unwaveringly at the politicians.

“Of course,” he says. “It would only be fair.” 

He notices Meis smirk out of the corner of his eye. They are greatly outnumbered, however. There are far more politicians here than Mad Burnish members. The rest of the Burnish in attendance are normal citizens, activists, a few who are musicians and artists. Some of them are just rich people who happened to have been Burnish. Lio isn’t familiar with all of them, though many have shaken his hand. 

Lio hopes the food is served quickly. That’s the only thing that will cut the tension for even a second. 

He briefly glances away from the crowd of politicians to the tables full of Burning Rescue members. There’s far more than just Galo’s squad, who he is most familiar with. Many of them are wearing suits, but a good number of them are also in their red jackets. Lio can see only glimpses of Galo’s hair, as these seats had been, however poorly, assigned.

What a wonderful way to promote unity, by dividing your guests into clear cut classes.

He keeps clicking his sword in and out of its sheath, trying to deny the vague pain coming on in his gloved fingers. He wonders how Kray is doing with his withdrawal. He had, after all, so proudly stated that he was so much more powerful than Lio Fotia. He seems to be sitting and chatting pretty calmly. 

But Lio can assume he’s feeling the same. He looks fairly healthy, though. At least from this distance.

He supposes he’ll know when the food is here.

He wonders if either of them will actually eat.

He wonders how many Burnish will finish their meals. Many of them seem to be a little sickly and tired. He wonders if any of the doctors on the other side of the aisle care. He wonders how long this marriage will last. 

He wonders when Kray will go to trial.

Lio glances back over at the Burning Rescue side of the hall, eyes traveling to where he knows Galo is sitting. He sees Galo turn around briefly to wave at him.

Lio smiles and gives him a little wave back. 

Galo gestures for him to come over to him.

Lio shakes his head and mouths “I can’t.” 

Galo makes a dramatically sad face at him. 

Lio smiles and shrugs. “I can’t!” he mouths again. 

Galo slumps over on the table.

Lio laughs.

Just then, he notices wait staff beginning to reappear on the far side of the Hall. They were much faster than he was expecting. Then he realizes that they're only bringing out drinks. The food isn’t ready quite yet.

Lio watches a waiter fill Kray’s wine glass. He sees him thank the man politely. Then as he takes his first sip, Kray turns his attention back to Lio.

Soon, Meis’s beer and a glass are being set on the table, followed by Lio’s cocktail and Gueira’s drink.

The tension and his stare remain unbroken as Lio takes a sip of something sweet and spiced that burns in his throat quite nicely. He feels the warmth flood through his veins and he relaxes a little bit in his seat.

“This evening is not going to end well,” Meis correctly predicts, pouring his drink into the glass. “Here I was trying to follow the plan and only ordered a beer.” 

Lio is aware that the other Burnish look nervous. Many of them were not in his camp, and were not on the Parnassus. They know him only as a terrorist who accidentally saved the world and maybe got rid of their powers and cursed them with chronic fatigue. They are his people, and he would always protect them, but at the same time they’re not. 

“I’ll be fine,” Lio says. “Don’t worry.”

“It’s not you I’m worried about,” Meis says.

Gueira glares over at him.

“I know how to behave. I’m not an idiot! I’ve had a few drinks before.”

Lio smiles and takes another sip. It almost feels like old times. And it’s easier for him to eat when he’s inebriated anyway. 

Slowly, as the attendees have their drinks and begin to relax, the atmosphere begins to ease. The endless war of stares is broken up by chatter and laughing. People start moving from their seats. Even some Burnish get up to talk to those on the other side of the room. 

The Burning Rescue members quickly merge with the politicians and it’s only a matter of time before Galo is trying to get his attention again. He once again silently begs him from across the room to come sit with him. 

Lio smiles and he supposed he can take a break from the staring contest just for a moment. He takes his feet off the table and stands up. He gestures for Gueira and Meis to follow him. 

They make their way over to the other side of the hall, weaving through tables and squeezing through a variety of people who probably either hate him or are afraid of him. When they finally get over to Galo, he stands up from his chair to wrap Lio in a quick hug. 

“How are you holding up? This has been super boring so far,” he says as he releases him. 

Boring isn’t exactly how he’d put it. 

“Oh, we’re doing fine,” he says, taking another sip of his drink and licking a bit of the salt on the rim of the glass. 

Aina turns around in her seat to say hello to him as well, and then the rest of the Burning Rescue members. Captain Ignis is still over here, which he appreciates. He’s learned to trust him to be fiercely on his side on a number of issues, especially regarding the actions of Freeze Force.

It’s much louder on this side of the hall. All these firefighters packed together are pretty noisy. There are no empty seats left at Galo’s table so the four of them stand and chat squeezed between three other tables. 

Lio is Idly aware of their proximity to the Colonel and his fellow (ex) Freeze Force members. And the Colonel is also aware, casting them leering toothy sneers every so often. 

Lio keeps his thumb on his sword. Gueria leans an arm on his shoulder and he is comforted by his weight. 

Vulcan finds his way over to them all inevitably, standing taller than anyone else in his pristine white suit.

He starts by clapping Ignis on the back. 

“Ignis! You all have been working your fingers to the bone so much, I’ve barely heard from you!” 

His voice is loud and almost mocking.

“Of course, we haven’t all had the luxury of abrupt obsolescence,” Ignis retorts quickly. 

Vulcan laughs a little too loudly. 

“Obsolescence? Who’s been keeping these Burnish from getting too rowdy in their bunks, huh? Like this one here, my good friend, Lio Fotia!” 

His hand is suddenly heavy on Lio’s free shoulder. It causes him to spill a little bit of his drink on the carpet.

“Hey, keep your hands off of him!” Gueira warns without hesitation. He feels him smooth out his suit for him.

Vulcan just laughs. 

“Glad to have your friends looking after you, then? Hope they’ll be able to stick around for their trials,” he says, leaning down a little closer to his eye level and pushing his way past Galo. 

Lio grimaces and all but rolls his eyes and sips on his drink. 

“Please don’t involve me in your internal disputes,” he says in a comparatively quiet voice. 

“Oh, that’s a pretty looking sword, too. Burnish always have to be prepared, I suppose!” he says.

In one quick movement, with his free hand, Lio slips the sword out of its sheath and holds it horizontally in between both of their faces, dividing up what little personal space either of them had with the shiny blade. They both are left glaring at their reflections.

“It’s ceremonial,” he says calmly. “It belonged to the previous leader of Mad Burnish and it isn’t sharp enough to kill anyone.”

Vulcan straightens his back and smiles down at him. 

“Why did you bring that here?” Aina whispers urgently to him from her seat at the table.

Vulcan reaches into his blazer. 

“Oh, well, this is ceremonial too!” he says excitedly.

In a fraction of a second, the barrel of a freezing pistol is pressed firmly against Lio’s chest.

“It won’t be necessary now, of course. It’s completely obsolete, so there’s nothing much to worry about!” He shouts. “Completely non lethal, a souvenir, really.” 

“Hey, hey!” Galo shouts abruptly, pushing himself between Lio and the freezing pistol. “This is supposed to be a party! Lay off him!”

“Wasn’t there a weapon’s check somewhere?” Aina whispers through an awkward grin. 

The colonel just laughs. Lio gives him a distrusting and sarcastically tight lipped smile, still clutching the sword. 

“Of course it is,” Vulcan says. “We’re all friends here.”

The man then puts the gun back into his suit jacket. He pats that side of his chest. 

Lio hesitates a second before finally re sheathing the sword in response.

“Of course,” Lio says. “No one’s going to get hurt this evening.”

“Lio-”

Vulcan absolutely roars with laughter and pushes Galo out of the way, shoving him into another guest at another table. He apologizes profusely as he spills a stranger’s wine on the nice white table cloths.

“Of course not! We wouldn’t want that!” Vulcan says, bringing himself all the way down to his line of sight. “Not after all that hard work you’ve been doing!”

Lio stays calm, but he feels Gueira lean down harder on his shoulder as he glares at the Colonel’s face. The weight of Meis’s arm joins him on his other shoulder. 

Lio takes the final few sips of his cocktail all at once and sets the empty glass down on Galo’s table.

“Yes, it would be a real shame to do all that work preventing the destruction of the planet and saving your life just to have it all end here at a dinner party,” he says. “It would be awfully petty and tragic.” 

They can only stare each other down viciously, unwaveringly. No one breathes and Vulcan just smiles wider and wider.

“Hey, hey. Come on- Everyone just cool off-” Galo says desperately. 

Just then, out of the corner of his eye, Lio notices wait staff beginning to appear in the hall again. They come over to Team 3’s table and start setting down plates of food. 

“Looks like dinner is ready. Maybe you should go eat,” the colonel suggests. “You look like you haven’t eaten in days. I hope you’re staying healthy.” 

Lio takes a calming breath through his nose. Vulcan backs off. 

“Keep up your hero boy act. You’re doing great,” he says to Galo, patting him roughly on the shoulder. 

He makes sure to glare at Ignis before beginning his push back through the crowd toward his table. Lio watches him walk away and doesn’t relax until he can see that he’s seated on the other side of the hall. 

“I want another drink and I’m not even done with this one,” Meis says, taking a sip of his beer. 

“I need to take advantage of Kray’s tab,” Gueira agrees. 

They both pull back from his shoulders, but stay close behind him. 

“Are you okay, Galo?” Lio asks. “He shoved you.”

“What? Yeah, I’m fine,” he says. He adjusts his wine-stained tie.

Lio picks up the napkin folded at his place setting. He notes that he also ordered the steak. He also notes that it looks a little grey and sad.

He quickly starts trying to mop up some of the wine on his suit for him, but it’s a fruitless effort. 

“It’s fine, I can go to the bathroom to clean it up,” he says. 

“Okay,” Lio says. “Use blotting motions, don’t rub it into the fabric. You’ll just make it worse.” 

“I know,” Galo laughs. “It’s okay.” 

Galo gently takes his hands in his and lowers them. His thumb rubs over his knuckle.

“I’ll be right back,” he says.

Lio hands him the napkin. Galo squeezes his shoulder and smiles softly at him before turning away. Lio watches him weave through tables until he is out of sight.

“We’d better get back to our food,” he says to Gueia and Meis. 

He turns to the rest of Team 3.

“It was nice talking to you all. We’ll talk more after dinner,” he says.

“You can bring your food over here if you want,” Remi suggests, unwrapping his fork and knife.

“I don’t know if there’s enough room,” Lio says. “It’s a bit cramped over here.”

“Plus he has glaring to do,” Gueira mumbles.

Lio’s mouth presses into a line.

“We’ll talk later,” Lio says finally.

Back at their table, their food has already been served. They tuck back into their seats and unroll their place settings. Lio glances across the room to see Kray already eating. Or at least, he is holding food on his fork. Lio can’t tell if he’s eating or not. 

Maybe it’s weird for him to be obsessed with this but he sort of just wants to make sure the man is suffering at least half as much as he is. He’d never wish it on another human being, but he can’t and won’t swallow his hatred for him. He has thoroughly decided he doesn’t deserve any forgiveness, even if there are a number of reasons he can’t actually kill him. 

As he starts twirling his fork into his pasta, though, the waitress returns to their table and places a glass of wine in front of him.

“Oh, uh, I didn’t ask for-”

“It’s from the Governor,” the waitress explains before placing two other glasses down for Gueira and Meis. Then she quickly turns away and disappears amongst the crowded tables.

Lio stares at the glass, then glances up at Kray, who is talking to Dr. Heiris. He glances at him for a moment though, and their eyes meet. Lio isn’t sure but he might smile at him. 

Lio smiles back and grits his teeth

“I’m going to fucking-”

Meis hand falls on his shoulder.

“You said we have to be civil, Boss,” he reminds him, picking up his own wine glass. He looks at it carefully, sniffs it tentatively.

“Do you think if it’s poisoned or drugged we’ll be able to tell until it’s too late?” Lio asks.

Gueira takes a tentative sip of his own wine. 

“Hmm, do you think they would’ve drugged our other drinks too?” he suggests, idly. 

Lio hums and picks up his glass. He hesitates for a moment before taking a sip.

“Boss…” Meis says cautiously. 

He lets the taste linger on his tongue for a moment. It just tastes like bitter red wine. However, he doubts he’d be able to taste it if they did anything to it.

“I won’t tell either of you to drink yours but I’m being watched,” he says. “I’m also unsure if it would benefit them to kill all three of us at one very public event. I believe if there is malicious intent, it is to kiss our asses.” 

He takes another small sip before putting it down on the table. He finally takes a bite of his pasta.

Gueira cuts into his steak.

Meis quietly looks around at the other guests.

“This is the worst steak I’ve ever had,” Gueira says.

As the evening progresses and the sky outside the window darkens, Lio finds his limbs feeling a little looser from the wine, a little more numb and a little less painful. The room starts to become louder and louder as well, as the guests get more and more comfortable. 

Lio only finishes half of his pasta, avoiding the unfortunately dry chicken. He picks at it a little throughout the night, but it isn’t good enough and he’s not hungry enough to warrant eating much more than that. 

It isn’t long into dinner when Lio notices someone starting to set up the stage and hears a few messy sound checks, and an apology. And it’s not long after that the lights dim and the speeches start. 

When Kray starts to speak, Lio watches his every movement more carefully than he hangs on his words. He doesn’t particularly care about what he has to say, and his voice is grating on his ears. Every word of his delicately mannered voice makes his stomach turn, the way he speaks softly to sound as non threatening as possible. 

Lio looks for any sign of suffering in his features. He does at least look tired. 

“....and I am so grateful for the work our Burning Rescue squads have been doing for us over these past few months to clear us out of this dreadful crisis. They are truly heroic in this time of great uncertainty after the Second World Blaze...”

Lio carefully notes that he never mentions that Mad Burnish has been helping, neglecting to mention many other Burnish activist groups as well. 

“...And we hope we can continue to lead this city out of this present crisis, and that you’ll continue to do your best work…”

 _You’d better fucking not be leading us when this is all over with._ Lio just stops himself from hissing. _You’d better be in jail or dead when this is over with._

He finishes his glass of wine. Then he realizes it was actually Gueira’s glass he was finishing, having already drunk his own. Oops. 

“Sorry,” he whispers. 

“What?”

“Nothing.”

He shoves the empty glass away.

“...And most importantly, I would like to thank Galo Thymos…”

“For kicking my ass-” Gueira whispers.

Lio and Meis both snicker.

“...For sending the alien Promare species back to its home dimension with assistance from the Burnish, Lio Fotia.”

“Assistance from _The Burnish…_ ” Lio smirks angrily. He’s not going to mention Mad Burnish, either. Clearly not wanting to draw too much attention to the fact that they’re working with someone they’d spent years propagating as a terrorist. 

“...I would like to also thank Mr. Lio Fotia for his unwavering cooperation during the cleanup efforts…”

Lio takes a deep breath and searches for any possible sign of fatigue or suffering in that man’s face. 

“And I would like to acknowledge Dr. Heiris for her contributions toward further research on the current state of the Ex-Burnish’s health, providing our physicians with information on the ways the Promare may have bonded with their bodies to help us understand how to help them…”

Lio slumps further into his seat.

“And Colonel Vulcan’s assistance in the Burnish Camps…”

Lio wonders if it would have been better and more of a statement for him to have stayed home. It would’ve at least been a lot safer as his anger starts to bubble up behind his eyes. He doesn’t realize how tightly he’s gripping his sword.

As Kray’s speech goes on and on, it becomes clear that, as much as Lio would like to retire as a gang leader and let Gueira and Meis live their lives, and as much as he’d like to wake up every day in Galo’s arms, there is still a need for resistance and change. He wishes his identity hadn’t become so public. 

When he’s done with his speech almost none of the Burnish clap. 

There is a pause while the rest of the room applauds him, however. Lio can only sigh. He tries to search for Galo in the darkened sea of tables.

When they are silent again, he proceeds with the next part of the ceremony. 

“It is now my greatest honor and pleasure to award both Galo Thymos and Lio Fotia with medals of honor for their great contributions in eliminating the threat of the Promare and Burnish from our society.”

Lio’s stomach falls and his knees are suddenly shaking. Something unidentifiable spreads all the way from his heart to his ribs out to his shaking fingertips. He can’t possibly accept an _award_ for essentially _eliminating_ his people and he feels nothing short of an urge to evaporate from this event.

As applause fills the room, he searches for Galo again. He doesn’t see him anywhere either. Lio stands up.

“Boss, what are you-”

“Shush,” he whispers.

He hits his hip on the table as he hastily stumbles out of his seat, suddenly aware of how much he’s had to drink this evening. The walk to the stage is dizzying. His stride, however, is extremely determined and his entire planned speech is forgotten. New words are swirling fast like a whirlwind in his mind. 

His heart is loud in his ears as he walks up the steps to the stage. He trips on the very last one. He suddenly feels a hand on his arm. He turns back to see Galo standing just behind him.

“Please, calm down,” he whispers to him. “Don’t do anything stupid. You don’t have to-”

“Kray Foresight, I’d like you to apologize for personally killing me,” he says stupidly, striding through the left stage curtain and onto the wooden floor. 

Galo follows slowly after him. The room is silent and his voice echoes in a way that feels so small and useless. 

He walks all the way toward the podium under the hot and bright lights. Everything in the room just rushes by him on adrenaline. 

“Kray Foresight tortured and killed thousands of Burnish. He tortured me and used me as fuel for his stupid space ship. He doesn’t care about any of you-”

He realizes he isn’t speaking into any microphone and his words are not carrying at all. His whole body is trembling.

Kray wordlessly steps back when he tries to take the podium from him. 

“I would never have done what I did to eliminate the Burnish from society,” he states firmly. “I sent the Promare back to their dimension to stop the earth from combusting and because it was what the Promare wanted. Any Burnish would’ve felt it- They were glad when they left-”

He takes a breath, realizing he sounds utterly insane to most of them. 

“I would never do any harm to the Burnish population, and I will not be accepting this award. Thank you. I will not be working with-”

“Are you done?”

He turns to see his shoulder practically rubbing against Kray Foresight’s chest as he clutches the podium. He breathes a disoriented breath as he stares up at the underside of Kray’s jaw, blinded by the stage lights haloing his yellow hair. 

He squints at him and finally sees the exhaustion in his face he’s been looking for, sees the beads of sweat rolling down his forehead and the gaunt shape of his cheeks. 

“You’re sick too,” Lio whispers.

Kray sighs. The audience is silent. 

The man turns his head toward stage right and beckons with his hand.

“Restrain him,” he says, shaking his head. “How disappointing… Lio Fotia… You would have been a valuable asset to this organization.” 

Lio steps back from the podium and his hand goes straight to his sword.

“Don’t make this worse for yourself,” Kray warns him. 

Members of the supposedly defunct Freeze Force are on the stage in a flash and there are (non lethal, of course, don’t worry.) freezing pistols at his chest and back and forehead. 

He hears clamor and the sounds of more footsteps on the stage. 

“Boss-”

“Don’t interfere-”

There’s a blast and the shattering of ice crystals and Lio is suddenly being roughly lifted off the floor. 

“I suppose that’s what you get when you’re forced to trust former terrorists for a moment,” Kray says, chuckling and adjusting his papers.

The crowd laughs as Lio is being dragged and thrown to the ground backstage. Gueira and Meis are thrown after him. 

Then he’s being picked up again and walked down the stage stairs, nearly tripping the entire time, his hands held in tight fists much larger than his own. He wishes desperately for the Promare to return to him and save him, and maybe burn them to the ground and-

He hears Gueira and Meis yelling in protest as they’re guided swiftly in front of the stage and passed the crowd. Colonel Vulcan is there to greet him and squeeze his hand around his cheekbones. 

“Even when we’re letting you have a win, you’re still a bad loser, eh?” he says. “Forget how small you are without your flames?

Lio doesn’t hesitate to kick him as hard as he can in the knees. This results in a fast and hard punch to the face, after which he’s dropped to the ground as everything goes black for a second. His hand finds his sword before he can even see again. 

There’s a rush of feet and voices. 

“He didn’t attack anyone- You can’t arrest him, all he did was-”

“He was clearly planning to-”

“He already-”

“I don’t care if-”

There are blasts and guests shrieking and Lio’s vision returns to stare at the spinning sight of Burning Rescue members arguing or maybe fighting with what’s left of Freeze Force. He’s apparently been momentarily forgotten on the floor. 

Someone- Not Ignis or Vulcan, not anyone he can see- throws the first punch and Lio suddenly has to roll out of the way to assure he isn’t trampled. He feels someone grab him by the back of his suit and haul him up to his feet. 

There are freezing bullets being shot in his direction, slamming into his back and creeping ice cold over his skin. He tries to block them with his sword, but he’s not quite as good with steel as he is with fire.

Someone in Freeze Force blocks him with a freezing baton anyway, buzzing with cold smoke and sending ice shattering down his blade. He knocks them backward as someone hooks an arm under his elbow and starts pulling him through the crowd.

“Galo-” he realizes. 

“I told you not to do anything stupid!” He yells as he drags him through what seems to be miles of flying fists and ice. 

“Oh, now suddenly you’re an expert on what is and isn’t stupid?” he yells back, doing his best to block stray ice chunks with his sword as they run. 

“Boss, you can’t let your boyfriend infect you with any more stupid germs,” Gueria says, appearing beside them to join in bolting through the choas, arms over his head to shield himself from the flying ice and punches.

“Yes he can. This is the most fun I’ve had in weeks,” Meis says, sipping on a cocktail.

“How long was I unconscious?” Lio asks, out of breath.

“About 30 seconds,” Aina says, a freezing pistol in her hands.

The growing cluster slams through the heavy back doors of the ballroom and into an empty hallway. Quiet washes over them. The roar of the brawl inside the hall is muffled by the doors slamming closed on their hinges. 

Lio suddenly feels stone cold sober. 

Their footsteps echo over floor tiles as they continue to run and run and run down the high ceilinged corridors. The sky outside is black and the moon is absolutely huge, flooding the floor with pale blue light. The windows of skyscrapers dot the horizon in place of stars. It all rolls by in a blur until they finally come to a stop to catch their breath.

The group leans, panting, against the smooth white walls.. 

“What the hell do we do now?” Aina breathes.

Lio puts his sword away and slides down the wall. He is alarmed at how out of breath he feels. 

“Boss?”

“Uhm…” he says. He feels something wet on his face and goes to wipe it off. There’s stinging pain all down his back. 

He looks at the back of his glove and is shocked to see a bright red trail of blood, followed by another fresh drop as it rolls off his face. 

“They can’t arrest him,” Aina insists. “He didn’t actually attack him.”

“I mean, Kray will pretty much do what he wants,” Galo says. “But I won’t let him. I don’t care. We have to just get out of here. No one here is getting arrested.” 

“Someone needs to arrest Kray,” Lio says. “But there’s no justice higher than him to hold him accountable. The planning for the trial is taking too long and he won’t just step down on his own.”

“This whole thing was being filmed, right?” Meis says. 

“How do we know they didn’t cut the cameras?” Lio asks.

“They didn’t,” Aina says, her phone already out. “At least not soon enough. You’re all over social media already.”

She shows Lio the screen and scrolls with her finger. 

“Great,” he pants. 

“Come on,” Galo says, pushing himself away from the wall. “We have to get out of here.” 

His hand comes up under Lio’s arm. He drags him to his feet one more time. He hates how weak his body feels, how vulnerable he knows he’ll be to anything they throw at him. He hates how vulnerable Gueira and Meis are too. 

But they all still have to keep running down the hall.


End file.
